So what's it like to have a sister?
by savegirl1
Summary: "Hey Chris!" Connor calls as the man was just leaving DPD for the day. "What's up?" "I heard that you had younger siblings. Um, can you teach me how to take care of a younger sister? The concept of being an older brother eludes me." Because somehow, Hank sorta adopted a teen girl off from the streets of Detroit...and now Connor is slowly learning what it means to be family
1. Just Another Day

Hello everybody! Warning, I have not written for yearssss and I'm going to be honest, kinda nervous about my dusty writing skills but I hope that as the characters grow, I will too and you guys will be there to see it. All in All, what started this story was the concept of "What if Hank Anderson had a daughter?(in addition to Connor)" And honestly, I just really wanted a lot of family fluff and thought it would be interesting to see how the story would flow because we have this very rough character, Hank, and a young android still learning to be deviant and I thought it would be cool to see how the family dynamic would change :D

But mostly I wanted to see a doting Hank and big brother Connor .~

Also another thing is that this story is sorta a suddenly appeared into the Video Game world kind of story, because I have been addicted to transmigration/reincarnation into a new world japanese novels(so some tropes from that genre will be included, if you can recognize them) and also im currently addicted to family fluff(as you can see in the tags). Well, overall I hope you enjoy my first chapter!

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-Dec 13th 2038-7:00pm-Detroit-

Despite having experienced a month of deviancy, Connor was still getting used to the concept of having feelings and emotions. And as of right now, the emotion that he was feeling the most was _annoyance_. He was sure that his LED was spinning yellow at this point, but he didn't care to hide it. Hank had been continuously complaining every five minutes about being sent on street patrol while it was snowing out. Of course, the snow wasn't as bad as usual; today's weather forecast had said that they would get at most a coating or an inch. Furthermore, although temperatures in Detroit right now were at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, Hank had turned the heat on in the old car making the street patrol ride quite comfortable.

As Connor sunk into the worn-out chair, he noticed that about 12 feet ahead of their current position was someone standing in the middle of the street. He got up just a bit closer to the windshield, earning himself a curse from the Lieutenant. However, he simply ignored it in favor of concentrating on the person ahead. He was correct, with his mechanical eyes he was able to zoom in and brighten up his vision in the night sky and see an East Asian teenage girl shivering in the middle of the road.

"Hank, we need to pull up on the street ahead, there seems to be a girl standing in the middle of the road. She looks very confused."

Hank let out an exasperated sigh. "Well, why the f*ck isn't she leaving the street?"

Connor quickly returned his eyes to his normal vision before answering back Hank's unruly comment.

"She's in pajamas and looks lost. It is best to check up on her."

"Yeah, yada yada yada. I got it, I'm moving the car. How old this girl?"

"I would say in the teens. But what I'm most concerned about is that she is not wearing proper outerwear. I predict that if she stays outside like that for 15 more minutes she could potentially reach a state of hypothermia." Well, Connor couldn't determine how long the girl had been standing outside already, but with all this snow blowing around he suspected they needed to quickly take action regardless.

"What?! Oh sh*t, what did you say earlier? That she's just up the street?" Hank began to speed up his engine compared to his original snail-like pace before noticing the shivering girl with his own eyes a couple of feet ahead. Hank pulled up right before the little girl's position and stretched his neck out the side window to call out to her.

"Hey kid! What are you doing out here?" The petite Asian girl stared out at Hank in alarm and wildly looked around her while clutching a doll in her arms. It appears that perhaps she had just come to the realization that she was standing in the middle of the road.

"I'm so sorry, I-uh-just got here? I'll get out of the way!" She apologized with a couple of bows before running to the sidewalk to the right.

"Wait! No, that's not...exactly what I meant." Hank let out a groan as his voice slowly died at the end of the sentence. "Connor, can you go out there and talk with her? If she's missing or a runaway, I mean, you know the protocol already."

"Of course." He quickly stepped out of the car. Shivering due to the sudden temperature drop, he decided to zipper up his brown cargo jacket to warm himself up. At that moment, it dawned on him that Hank had an extra jacket in the trunk to lend to the girl. It was probably full of dust and extremely worn out, but it will have to do for now. He went to the back trunk and heaved out the large black leather jacket with wool lining. Shaking it, he watched dust fall out of the jacket and float alongside the snowflakes drifting in the wind. He silently hoped the jacket wasn't too contaminated that it caused further harm to the girl than comfort.

Tucking the jacket around his arm, he approached the Asian girl on the sidewalk and she seemed to back away a bit with each step he was taking forward.

"I'm not here to hurt you," Connor put his hands up with his palms open to her. "I'm with the DPD and we were concerned about you being in this harsh weather." He pulled out the badge that he had received a month ago and a smile escaped his lips subconsciously as he recalled the joyous occasion.

She slowly approached him and this time he can clearly see her in the blowing snow without having to use his advanced technology. She was about 5'1" based on his calculations, had pale white skin, light brown eyes, and slightly wavy black hair that reached past her shoulders. At the moment, she was wearing a matching top and bottom gray pajamas spotted with little red-nosed reindeer and a pair of purple indoor slippers. He also noted that the doll she was clutching was from the game Overwatch and the character was Dva. _Huh, we have a gamer here then._

"May I ask what is your name?" Her reaction to his question seemed a bit surprising, as her eyes quickly widened and her jaw dropped a bit. What it really that surprising of a question? Or did it have something to do with his appearance?

She quickly shook her head, "I'm sorry about that," and waved away whatever was in her head and bothering her. "My name is Alina." She made an attempt to smile back, but it quickly wavered away as she shuddered in the cold.

"And what you are doing out here in a winter storm? Do you need a lift? Are you lost?" He took the chance to wrap Hank's jacket around the small girl and felt his thirium pump settle down as the girl stopped shivering as much.

"Y-yes. I just got here, I'm kinda lost. Can you help me?"

He gave her a quick nod before guiding her to Hank's car and letting her sit in the back seat.

"So what's your problem kid? Is the heat back there good? Man, you almost look like a frozen snowman back there." Hank took a look at the heater status and turned up the dial a bit.

"Is it alright," Alina took a glance at the window, "if I can ask a question first?" Her voice wavering as she turned her attention back to us.

"Sure, question away."

"Um, can you tell me where we are?" She asked softly while squinting through the car window, amiss the snowy storm raging.

Using his internal GPS coordinates, Connor was successfully able to convert them into Street names.

"We're currently following Dubois Street, and we found you just past the intersection of Dubois and East Canfield Street." He looked up to the rear-view mirror to see that Alina had creased her brows in response to his coordinates.

Biting her lips, it took her a few seconds before she uttered a follow up question.

"Hmm, is it alright if I can get the city name? You said earlier that you were part of the DPD, which city police department is that? I don't really recognize that as my city's police department."

Hank looked bewildered for a second and took a quick look at the rear-view mirror before he answered back.

"This is Detroit. Where are you from?"

"We're in...Detroit?" The words seemed to have slowly tumbled out of her and with his advanced hearing he noticed that her heart rate had gone up too. Her eyes were no longer focused and in a daze for a few moments. Judging by her reaction, he assumed she was displaced very quickly and without her knowledge or consent. He began complying a list of possible reasons she was here. A kidnapping? Human trafficking? She's definitely not just _lost_.

Suddenly, she seemed to have switched gears. She took in deep breaths and her gaze turned sharp and then suddenly determined. That's different, according to his database, most kids would panic and need consolation from an adult. But here she was, becoming calm and focused, as if she was trying to take control of the situation…like an adult. Her face grew dark as she went into intense thinking, and he watched as she mouthed a mix of incoherent words. Her face grew grimmer as the seconds passed and an uncomfortable silence fell on top of them.

"May I ask what's today's date too?"

"It's-"

"What date do you believe today is?" Connor gave an apologetic smile to Hank for interrupting. Luckily the older man didn't mind, and just gave a nod back, signaling that he understood Connor's intentions. Alina squirmed under Connor's gaze from the rear-view mirror reflection, going into deep thought with her hand lightly pressed underneath her chin in a thinking pose once more. What was more unusual was that she began to bury her head into her palms multiple times, despite the fact that it was an easy question. Hank shot Connor a concerned look, but still kept focused on the road to watch out for patches of ice.

And after what seemed like ages of pondering, she finally responded with what seemed more like a question than an answer.

"December 12th?"

Connor was going to reply back 'no', but it looked like his expression gave that away first as she instantly started panicking and apologizing. For what she was apologizing about, he didn't completely understand, but his detective skills were telling him that there's more to the story than what they had now.

"You're close enough kid, it's December 13th. Why you gotta fret about it?" Hank shouted back in an attempt to reassure her.

The next set of words that she uttered set Connor's detective gears into motion some more.

"_A Timeskip?"_

It was spoken at around 200 Hz, most humans wouldn't have heard what she said, but Connor being an advanced android, was able to pick it up. Her eyes were downcast and dazed once more so he assumed that the word 'timeskip' wasn't something she had intended for them to hear.

True to Connor's guess, Hank responded to Alina's mutter with a "Hm?" But Hank didn't press the girl on that subject, instead opting for other questions.

"So you mind telling us where you from? Hometown? Parents? That way Connor can get started on the paperwork and find a way to get you home quickly."

"That...you don't need to," her head suddenly hung down and her grip on the Dva character became stronger. "They're gone anyway."

Hank narrowed his eyes, "What do you mean by gone? Are they dead?"

Slowly, Alina nodded her head back in reply while keeping her head down and tucked over the Dva doll. To his left, Hank let out an exasperated sigh and rubbed the corners of his clearly worn out face. Connor noticed that when it came to death cases, especially the ones with families, Hank has a tendency to tense up a bit. He could tell Hank was in no mood to deal with this case today.

"Any friends or acquaintances you can stay with?" Hank kept his attention on the road for slippery spots, but Connor noticed that Hank's grip on the steering wheel grew slightly tighter. He mentally made a reminder to later ask Hank if he was alright once they were out of Alina's sights.

"…"

Alina didn't respond immediately, which worried Connor over how Alina was going to reply.

He watched as the edges of her lips turn into a frown. "Nah. They're gone too."

An empty silence hung over the car after this. Connor wanted to ask more. If all of her family and acquaintances were gone, did that mean they all died in a natural disaster? Or perhaps a massacre? It's one thing to be an orphan, but another thing when everyone you know and love is gone too. Though, it may simply be the case that Alina simply didn't know many people. His curiosity was getting the better of him, but he took one look at Hank's strained expression and knew that it wasn't good to press on in these types of situations. He was still learning and getting used to the concept of emotions, but he was starting to understand what things were considered emotionally appropriate in varying situations.

The car ride ended up silent on the rest of the way to the DPD and they quickly ended up at the station within five minutes. The trio walked into the station together and were greeted by some stares from the rest of the department that was still there. It made sense considering they mostly worked in the Android Homicide Department, and today they walked in with a small teenage girl by their side.

Hank smirked at Alina's awe with her twinkling eyes looking all around her.

"Welcome to DPD's Central Station kid. I'll get you set up real quick with someone that helps out orphan kids. Just have a seat at my desk for now." Hank pointed to the direction of his desk, gave her a pat on the back and set off to find another officer before leaving Alina to Connor.

* * *

Elllooooo, yes I left the h out of hellloooooo. That shall be my greeting. Hmmm, so it was interesting to decide which type of connor I was going to portray bc there r like 3 versions: canon connor, headcanon connor, and fandom connor. So i decided towards headcanon and canon-ish connor. So yes, this takes place exactly 1 month after the peaceful revolution. Lol yes, I am one day off, as the revolution speech after their success takes place at Nov 12th around 12:01 am. I apologize if the story had some grammar issues, sometimes I end up missing them.

Ahh, yes I also will be making some jokes that I hope will appeal to those in the Asian community. Because minority reppppp, yay! And also just to poke fun at these daily hardships as an Asian, well, mainly in America since I'm an ABC, those in the Subtle Asian Traits facebook community would most likely understand. But pleaseee don't feel left out if the Asian jokes don't necessarily get to you! I will make sure to put plenty of family fluff, because that was my original purpose alongside some angst bwahahahahha. *cough* It will be related to the politics and power struggle segment. *cough*

So, I hope you will enjoy the ride with me and I will be doing some Q&A sessions if anything needs clarification or if you are curious behind some of the storyboard stuff I've done so far. Or if you just wanna ask the story characters so stuff, like their favorite color or favorite sibling activity.

Critiques are welcomed! Bc I haven't written in forever and am looking forward to evolving my writing. Had a little trouble filling the gaps between dialogue for this chapter, but i hope in time I will be able to make the writing smoother.

Ladies n gentle good night! Or good morning, idk where you guys are around the world.

Ps, if you have any sibling stories feel free to pm or comment and I might include them as siblings drabbles .~

Fun Fact: Dubois St and East Canfield Street are indeed real streets of Detroit, looked up street view in Google maps for a suitable location for the 1st meet up, if you wanna see what that area is like.


	2. Under My Wing

Ladies n gentlemen! A late happy lunar new yr to those tht we're celebrating it.

Another note about updates, they will depend on how fast I can write them and how fast I can have my friends beta read it, we all suffering college students ;( tryna juggle the beautiful game of life. For now, my goal is try to submit one chapter per week. - i died this week trying to finish this chapter on time. Mentally deprived so I apologize in forward if there r grammar/spelling mistakes. But mostly I guess the biggest time consumer is prob shifting to show and not tell writing. I look over like a lot of references to try to redo my writing, i think i spent like 12 hours on this XD did an hour each day and then a lot on friday

Shoutout to Vin especially for the amazing comment, I was like super saiyan motivated in writing the story after seeing the encouraging comment. Also shoutouts to uwillbeefound, JazzyHere, IrrationallyLogical and the guests that left kudos on this work and for those that bookmarked this!

Anyway, here is ur ch2! Reminder that is this a 'suddenly into a video game world' type of story~

* * *

Alina was at _**the DPD**__._

And it looked just like the version in the game, if not any better. She secretly pinched her arm to double check if this was reality. _Ouch!_ _That hurt. A LOT. _She shouldn't have pinched herself that hard. But in all honesty, if anyone had said that they miraculously jumped into a video game world, most people would think of that said person as cRaZy. Yet, here she was, in her FAVORITE video game called Detroit:Become Human.

Literally twenty minutes ago, she was just calmly chilling inside her college dorm suite. It had been an exhausting day for her: 3 hours of part time work, 4 hours total of college classes, and another 3 hours of studying as well as homework. And FINALLY, just when Alina thought she could get some quality sleep, she opened the door to her room, only to face some blinding white light and then found herself smack in the middle of a road.

At first, she thought she was hallucinating or perhaps she simply collapsed on her way to her room and was asleep on the ground. But the Dva doll she was carrying from the living room was VERY MUCH THERE and so was the blowing snow whisking around her. It had slowly piled itself on her and the cold air biting her skin just confirmed that she somehow got transported to the outdoors. And that this was not a dream, at allllll.

It got weirder when Hank and Connor showed up in the snowstorm too. She didn't recognize Connor at first with all the blowing snow, and by the time she did, she most likely looked like an idiot with her gaping mouth. When he approached her initially, she thought he was one of those people looking to pick a fight after a fit of road rage. After spacing out and realizing the person in front of her was Connor, she had simply hoped the blowing snow covered up her cheeks, which were burning with embarrassment. It also didn't help that she was pretty sure that she looked even more suspicious to them when she evaded their questions and answered vaguely.

"Alina?"

"Hm?" She looked up from Hank's desk where she had apparently been staring at. She was currently situated on an extra chair near Hank and Connor's work space. As Alina expected, their work desks were right across from each other.

"Are you alright? I've been calling your name for a while now." Connor had a concerned look on his face.

"Sorry," she gave a small smile back. "I've just got a lot on my mind right now and I'm trying to sort everything out."

Connor gave a courteous nod back, "Of course."

For a second Alina thought he was just going to leave her be after that, but just as he started working on DPD paperwork, he stopped and turned his attention back on her again.

"Would you like some warm water?"

The sudden gesture surprised her a bit, but she made sure to quickly give back a polite response.

"Yes, that would be nice. Thank you." Alina watched as Connor got up from his seat and went into the break room on the side. Her eyes followed him until he disappeared behind the wall and her mind recalled the game sequence scene with Gavin in the same break room. In her first playthrough, poor Connor was left with the coffee in his hand after accepting Gavin's request to bring him a coffee.

She let out a soft sigh, she had wanted to establish a good relationship with other DPD coworkers in her first playthrough. But in the end, Gavin was just deemed an asshole by the majority of the fandom and like them, she wanted to give him a punch by the end of the game. Speaking of Gavin, Alina wondered if he was on duty today. She did not want to come up with another string of half truths and half lies, especially to _him_. Just the thought of him made her scrunch up her face and body. She looked around for a bit and to her relief, she didn't see him around the facility. She only hoped there wasn't going to be a repeat of the game sequence today and that he wasn't situated in the break room right now.

While waiting for Connor to come back, Alina took the time to mentally prepare for the barrage of questions she'd receive from the police.

Well, she managed to avoid the hometown question earlier once, but it was bound to come up again. She was from New York, but it's not like she could say that. One, they might send her there. Two, even if they do, she _doesn't_ exist there, **in this world in general. **She doesn't belong here, and it sent a knot down to her stomach as she hugged her Dva doll closer to her body. Three, that meant no way of identifying her.

She just turned 18 too, that meant officially, she's a proper adult. But it's not like she has any financial means to support herself. No Social Security number, no ID, no way to get a job. Subconsciously, Alina began to curl up as more and more problems of surviving in this new world invaded her mind. _If this really isn't a dream and I don't find a way back...how do I even start a new life here?_ It was at that moment that she lifted her head up to see a DPD ceramic cup set before her. She leaned into the table at the nice smell coming from it. She was surprised that instead of warm water she got a light brown drink with a fluff ball of whip cream floating on top. Confused for a moment, she turned her head back to Connor for an answer.

"I hope that you like hot chocolate. I read that most kids like the drink especially on a cold day and thought it would be better than water especially since you seem downhearted."

Alina accepted the warm drink and took a sip, smiling to herself as she relished in the sweetness of the chocolate. The drink wasn't too overly sweet to the point that it overwhelmed her and it had just the right amount of sugar. _As expected of Connor to perfect the sugar to milk chocolate ratio._

"Thank you, it's perfect!" She replied back, grateful for the additional warmth from the hot cocoa. She looked up to see Connor, who was now across from her, beaming from the compliment.

"I'm glad you're enjoying it. While you're at it, could you fill out this paperwork too?" He handed her a mini glass panel and when Alina tapped on it, it lit up to reveal a digital fill out form. Unfortunately, that meant putting her Dva doll down onto Hank's messy table, but she'd rather not accidentally drop the tablet placed into her hands.

Curiously, she began playing around with the device. Until now, she had forgotten that the tablets featured in the game were basically like glass panels. It was definitely much more different than the ones featured by Apple and Samsung back in 2018. Her lips parted slightly with wonder at the device in her hand. As her fingers moved about the smooth panel, she found herself skimming through the couple pages of 'paperwork' she had to fill out. The form simply asked her to fill out basic information: Name, date of birth, address, etc. Name was easy, there was no harm in putting down her real one. Alina Niu.

Date of Birth. _That's going to be a bit of a problem._ Using her real birthday of December 5th was fine, it's just the year that she'd have to change. She could make herself 18, like she actually was, but in all honesty she didn't look like one with her small height of five feet one. Plus, there was the problem that being 18, meant that you were an adult and that came with its own set of problems. At least if she were a kid, shelter and food wouldn't be a problem since the government would take in orphans. _It's settled then, I'll be a kid._ _Well, a teen to be more specific. 17? No, that would be too close to 18. 16? A 2 year difference should be fine, I mean, I look the part anyway. 16 it is. 2038-16=2022. That'll be my new birthday: December 5th, 2022._ Typing her new birthday into the tablet left a weird and unsettling feeling in her stomach, but she'll have to do it for survival.

Alina also realized that she'll also have to constantly remind herself to stop writing 2018 at the end of dates too. The last date that she remembered was December 12th, 2018; however, according to Hank it was now December 13th, 2038. She found it peculiar how it was almost exactly two decades of a timeskip, well, except for that extra one day time difference.

_Hmmm, let's move on._ Ethnicity? Chinese American. Gender? Female. Parents. _Should she put their names down? _If she were to put down her parent's information, then they could use that to 'find her hometown' or any relatives. In either case, she had none at the moment in this world. It's 2038 with Androids capable of billions of calculations within a minute, the DPD Police department could easily contact other cities to get information. It would be better to keep that blank. Address? Nope. She looked over the form once more, filling in other miscellaneous items and handed the tablet back to Connor.

"Do you...not like filling out paperwork?" Connor inquired.

Alina tilted her head to the side in confusion, "Huh? What makes you say that?"

"You were furrowing your brow quite often during the process of typing everything out." Connor took a quick look at the tablet's pages and paused for a moment. "Furthermore, you seemed to have purposely skipped out on a number of parts. Or does the environment in which you are currently situated in, make you uncomfortable in any way?"

Alina quickly took a look around and found nothing unusual that would disturb her.

"No, everything seems normal around here." She frowned a bit trying to think of the reason behind Connor's last comment. She was simply thinking about how to explain her suspicious background. _Oh, yes. I forgot that I'm considered a recently orphaned child, maybe that's what he's thinking along the lines of? Being in an unfamiliar environment? Or rather the police station? _

"I guess, it's just sorta overwhelming." She let out a nervous laugh and shrugged. "Like I don't know what's going to happen to me after this. I...don't really have a home, you know?"

She watched as Connor went into deep thought for a couple of seconds as his LED whirled yellow.

"Why don't you stay with us for now? I'm sure Hank won't mind."

She stared at him back in response. _**The Anderson Connor.**_ _Wait no-Connor Anderson was offering to let her stay at their place for a while._

"You sure? Won't Hank mind?" She quickly stopped herself to properly address the older man, "I mean-Lieutenant Anderson, won't he mind?"

"I mean, I'm sure I can persuade him. Besides, statistically speaking we always have a chance." He gave her a reassuring smile from across the desk.

"Thank you!" She beamed, jumping up and giving him a hug, nearly knocking over the hot cocoa on the desk. She noticed that Connor was initially stiff to her touch, but then he reciprocated the hug by awkwardly patting her back with his right arm. When she let go, she noted that he was slightly flustered and maybe she was imagining it, but his cheeks had light tints of blue.

"Sorry! You probably don't like hugs. I should have asked first." She took a step back and rubbed her left arm sheepishly before sitting back down.

"No, no, it's fine. I've just never really been hugged before, other than Hank. It was…nice." He had a gentle expression on his face, but Alina was still worried if it was just his programming to appeal to humans. She went back to sipping her hot chocolate for the next couple of minutes when she felt a tap on her left shoulder. She looked up to see Hank and an East Asian female police officer. She looked familiar to Alina, perhaps she was one of the minor characters in Detroit: Become Human.

"Hey Alina, this is Officer Tina. She is just going to ask you some more questions and help you out, alright? You can take the hot chocolate with you too, if you want."

Officer Tina waved to her and greeted Alina with a 'Hello.'

"It's nice to meet you, Alina. I'm just going to ask you a few more questions and help you get settled into Detroit, alright?"

Alina nodded back and picked up her Dva and cup, following Tina's lead. She took one more look back at Connor, waving a goodbye before quickly turning back to Tina and hoping to hide the mild anxiety on her mind.

"See you around kid."

* * *

"Anderson!"

Hank turned around from his desk chair to see Fowler waving him over to his office. _Ugh, what now?_ It had been a quiet day compared to other days of the week being flooded with android cases. The only big thing thankfully was that kid Alina, but Tina took care of that. When he walked into the glass office room he noticed that Alina's file was in Fowler's hands and something told him that he was going to have to deal with the kid again.

"What's up Jeffrey?"

Fowler let out a sigh, rubbing his neck before delivering the news.

"I need you to take care of that girl you brought in." Fowler looked him dead in the eye with a serious expression on his face.

"What the f*ck?! Why not have Tina or *Pearson do it?" Hank retorted.

"Tina and Person are roommates and _**if**_ **you just stayed a little longer** in last week's meeting you would have known that they have family staying over."

Hank clenched his teeth before resigning to take a seat and arguing further.

"What about the other female cops in the precinct? I'm not cut out for this."

Fowler folded up his hands onto the tabletop and leaned in closer to Hank, lowering his voice down a notch.

"Look, the kid was insisting that she wanted to go with you. And apparently Connor already offered to let her stay at your place."

Fowler had more to say, but upon hearing that last sentence he snapped his head around to glare at Connor. The android seemed to have sensed Hank's glaring because Connor perked up suddenly and returned a pasted smile to him. _That son of a bitch. Connor, why the hell did you offer our place?! I don't want to deal with taking care of a kid._

"Hank!"

Turning his attention back to Fowler, he stroked the top of his forehead in anticipation of what was to come.

"Look, it's just a couple of days and you know government facilities are barely running. You think the government has the money or resources right now to keep their federal orphanage center running? The city is running at barely half its normal capacity, most of the city's people have yet to return to Detroit. Plus the Android Assimilation Act has only recently been enacted and doesn't give full rights to androids yet so everyone's in a bind right now."

Hank simply groaned and looked away.

"Hank. She's not a little kid. She's 16, all you gotta do is give her food and shelter. And while you are at it, monitor her cause she's refusing to tell us anything about her background, family, or hometown. Just for a few days-"

Hank lifted his hands up to silently say that he got the message and point of the conversation.

"I got it! BUT just for a few days, no more than that." He pointed at Fowler with a threatening look, and as usual Fowler didn't falter from Hank's gestures.

"I've already spoken to Connor earlier a bit and I'll give you a small bonus as compensation for her living expenses, alright? Now pick up the damn little girl, Hank." Fowler waved off Hank, shooting him out of the office.

As Hank walked out of Fowler's office, he found Tina approaching from the right with Alina by her side. _What the hell man, he's going to have to give Connor one heck of a conversation when they get home._

* * *

So as you can see, the level of writing quality sorta declined towards the end because I was rushing to finish this chapter before the weekdays came back to attack me XD I hope you guys still enjoyed it regardless, was hoping to write another page of writing for this chapter but I ended up needing the time for some schoolwork. And honestly im just like dead rn :p

*Also Pearson was supposed to be "Person". Apparently in the game according to the wiki, Person was legitimate last name of an officer in the DPD, she was a Asian female minor character like Tina Chen. Idk y that is her last name but it just was, so i just ended up changing it slightly

The following is just some thoughts on how I wrote some things in the chapter:

So imma be honest, i pondered btw whether or not the androids could blush n if they could, which color would it be. Bc humans blush pink due to a rush of blood, which is red. So I decided tht since they have blue blood, androids would probably blush blue? Though i pondered if they would have pink blush since androids are supposed to be similar to humans.

And yes one of Connor's replies to Alina was a reference to how he said "There's a high probability [of failure]... but statistically speaking, there's always a chance for unlikely events to take place." I just slightly reword it to pay homage, and also since the situation is like, u know, less dire. (.~)/

Overall, there was a lot of exposition here as i was tryna decide if i should do a flashback and explain alina's pov on what happened and so i ended up sorta doing a flashback? But not exactly?

Tried to fill in the dialogue some more too. AND WHOOOPPP WROTE 2,700 words, more than my usual so big win

**BUT! Enough rambling on my part, overall please kudos and comment, and lots of love for yall cuz ik everyone is prob stressed out from something right now maybe. U CAN DO THIS! THE WEEKEND OF FUN WILL COME AGAIN**


	3. Reasoning

Hello everyone, its a bit of a morbid day because I found out tht an amazing artist, Qinni( qinniart) just passed away. She was just updating us a couple days ago on her condition fighting cancer and a heart disease and how she would keep fighting. And we just found out tht on 2/11 she passed away. It just goes to show, please cherish everyday that you have and live your life to the fullest bc u never know wat can happen and u dont want to live with regrets. Im going to be honest, being a writer of an original character story tht isn't really romantically involved rn with the main characters of DBH has been a bit difficult since the audience size is smaller, and I've like considered giving up multiple times in the past but seeing this event just reminded me tht we should keep pushing forward with our dreams n test our abilities since difficulties can come out of the blue. This chapter was hard to do due to writer's block, but I made sure to keep pushing through.

Now onto SHOUTOUTSSSS: BIG BIG shoutout to Vin, ur support in the comments is always super helpful in keeping me motivated for this story when im doubting myself and get silent responses. shoutout to Th3RedPyro for the amazing review and encouraging me on this story. Also shoutout to MaydayMarbear and the guests tht left kudos! 3

All in all, everyone, please take care of your health if u can and for now here is ur ch3 tht i hope u all will like and maybe cheer you up if you know of the twitter artist as well

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In all honesty, Hank wanted to ask a barrage of questions to the two kids now situated in his car as they drove to his house. But he was afraid that he was going to lose his temper and distracted driving was a big no-no for him right now.

He looked to the right for a moment while at a red light and caught a tiny smile on the fringes of Connor's face. What the kid was so happy about, he didn't understand. Hank let out a huge sigh and silently cursed.

Out of all the goddamn stupid things Connor had to do, why the hell did Connor offer their place to the kid? Hank drinks, curses all the time, and barely knows how to take care of himself, much less someone else. Heck, Connor was still going about Hank's unhealthy diet. He was willing to change his burgers only diet, but Connor's method was too drastic. The android would ramble about the total number of calories intake the older man shouldn't be going over, put lots of veggies onto his plate for dinner, and bombard him with a lot of facts on the importance of exercising more. It was just too drastic of a change, especially the vegetables suddenly inserted into his palate with no seasoning at all. I-It just didn't work for him.

Before he knew it, Hank found himself in front of his driveway and parked right in front of his garage. He glanced up to the rear mirror and found Alina clutching her doll with a guilty expression. Did she think he was mad at her? If anything, he was more mad at the fact that Connor didn't ask for permission first before letting the kid stay with them.

"Come on, out of the car. We're here."

They stepped out of the car and walked to his doorstep. That's when Hank paused and realized he should probably warn Alina about Sumo coming out to greet them.

"Oh yeah, I have a dog. He's a Saint Bernard." He watched as Alina's somber expression from the pavement became uplifted as soon as he mentioned the word 'dog'. "He won't attack or anything, but pretty sure he's going to give us a big greeting when I open the door. He's quite friendly." He was going to ask if she was good with dogs, but judging by her elated face, he didn't have to.

As expected, as soon as he opened up the doorway and walked in Sumo met them at the door with a friendly bark.

"Woof!" The older dog went up to Hank first and then Connor, before approaching the girl behind them. As Hank closed the door behind them, Alina bent to the floor so that she was at Sumo's level and let Sumo sniff her. As the dog examined the child, Alina laid her arms by her side with her palms facing upwards and Sumo took a sniff at her hand as well. A few seconds later, Sumo happily barked at her before licking her hand and then her face, which caused laughter to erupt from Alina. Slowly, she patted Sumo's shoulder and the dog leaned into her touch while its tail wagged to the right.

"Hello little guy, what's your name?" She said, cooing at the dog. She gives a big smile to Sumo while scratching him behind the ear.

"Sumo." Connor replies and scratches Sumo's other ear to which the dog's tail wags even faster, happy to have the attention of the two.

"Awwww, he's so cute!" Alina squeals as she gives him one final pat. When she stopped, Sumo put his paw onto her lap and playfully nudged her on the shoulder.

It looks like she gained Sumo's approval. Out of the corner of his eyes, Hank sees Connor with a happy expression, most likely due to finding another dog lover.

"I think Sumo wants some more attention kid. Why don't you chill with him on the couch? Scroll through some TV channels, I've got to talk to Connor for a bit and then we'll order pizza for dinner. How does that sound?"

She gives him a nod back and as she gets back up from the ground, her eyes slowly widen at the surroundings. Was his house really that messy? He knew he wasn't the cleanest or tidiest of people, but mostly because he didn't want to bother with cleaning. Connor had been helping around with organizing the house a bit. But he told Connor not to bother too much about it, so it ended up being only slightly better than its original messy form. Maybe he _should_ clean up a bit.

Alina sank into his couch and Sumo quickly followed after her. The Saint Bernard climbed onto the couch, sitting right next to her and resting his head on her lap as she picked up the TV remote to scroll through the channels. He hoped the dog wouldn't get too attached to the girl in the limited number of days she was going to be staying here. Hank _**did not**_ want to deal with a whimpering dog after Alina leaves their household.

"Oh yeah, any toppings?" He asked.

"No, plain is fine," she quickly replied back.

"Alright then." Hank turned his attention to Connor and pointed to his own bedroom. "A word with you Connor." Instantly, Connor's expression turned a bit grave.

Hank shuts the door behind them and he finds Connor sitting down on Hank's bed. Connor's head is hanging downward and his eyes refuse to look directly at Hank. It reminds him a bit of Cole when the little boy did something mischievous and got caught red handed. The similarity makes his heart ache a bit, but he pushes the feelings aside to focus on the problem at hand.

"Connor, you can't randomly invite people to stay in our house!" He watches as Connor winces to his tone and he groans as Connor looks up at Hank with puppy eyes. God damn it, he knows Connor doesn't intentionally make those expressions, especially as a deviant. The boy was still emotionally awkward, so he knows it isn't exactly a ploy and that those emotions are genuine. He drew in his breath and let it settle for a moment. _Why the hell did CyberLife give Connor such a weird face?_

"From my database, I know...that when people are in an unfamiliar environment they tend to prefer to stay near those who they are most familiar with," Connor tried to reason, this time properly looking at Hank and giving eye contact.

Hank ran his hand through his hair and let out another sigh.

"Yeah, well. _**We only met her for a few minutes**__,_" He hissed back fiercely. "There's **no way** she got attached that easily." He continued on angrily, jabbing his fingers into the air. He took a quick glance at the door and silently thanked his ability to be able to contain his voice in such a situation. No need to let the kid know that he didn't want her here, especially when she just lost her family. He turned his attention back to Connor and saw the boy's shoulder sink. well at least he still got the message through to Connor, that's what mattered.

"I'm sorry that I've upset you Lieutenant." Connor responded back, eyes trained to the ground once more and somehow his shoulders have slumped even more. Oh god damn it, Hank just realized that Connor receded back to Lieutenant outside of work instead of saying Hank.

"I-I just thought...when I looked at her and she was lost. It reminded me of after the revolution, where I had nowhere to go. Markus had welcomed me to Jericho of course. But I didn't feel like I belonged there after being a deviant hunter. It was you that offered me a place to stay and find a place to call home."

Hanked simply stared back at Connor's heartfelt comment. He was stunned that Connor saw him so highly.

"She's an orphan that lost everything. Even if her background is suspicious," Connor paused, furrowing his eyebrows. "I believe the two of us are more than capable of handling her. She's lost...just like I was. And according to DPD records, after the revolution Detroit's Foster Care Centers closed and relocated the children elsewhere. I believe they won't be coming back for a while."

For a moment there was just a standstill between them as Hank tried to process everything. This kid, Connor, was so _sincere and genuine_. It was hard to believe that some at Jericho still nicknamed him the Terminator.

"I apologize if I abused your hospitality, Lieutenant." Connor's elbows were on his knees, hands clasped in front of himself as he waited for Hank's next move.

Hank rubbed the nape of his neck once more and took a seat next to Connor on the edge of the bed. He was initially going to reprimand Connor, but he lost that urge after hearing Connor's reasoning.

"Look son, I'm not mad." Connor instantly turned his head to Hank's direction, disbelief and confusion written across Connor's face.

"Well, I am. But not too much now." Hank watched as Connor's body relaxed a bit more as he continued talking. "It's just-you can't just let people suddenly stay over. Just, you know, give me a heads up. Talk it out with me and I know I don't exactly have the best record with people. Maybe that's why you chose to have Jeffrey tell me. But I ain't exactly a crappy person either...especially after I met you."

Connor's body froze upon hearing the last part of what Hank had said and simply stares at Hank for a moment before a smile escapes the boys' lips.

"I'm, uh, glad you feel that way." Connor fidgeted around with his fingers before uttering another statement that stops Hank in his tracks. "Thanks Dad."

Hank's mouth curled into a fond smile and he gave Connor a hug.

"Anytime, son." As far as Hank knows, he'll never regret the decision of adopting Connor to become one of the first android-human hybrid families. He'll do whatever it takes to protect Connor in this mess of Detroit. They let go, and Connor is returning a warm smile to him.

"So she's staying, right?"

"Well, of course. Jeffrey gave me the order. What? Are you happy that you got another dog lover here? Am I not enough?" He teases, giving a quick pat to Connor's back before getting up. "Only for a few days though. A _WEEK_ at most." He sees Connor grinning back as the other gets up as well.

"I count that as a win."

"Only for a few days though. Also, you are ordering the pizza and keeping her entertained."

"Already ordered it prior to our discussion. It should be arriving in 15 minutes." The younger android smirks back.

Hank opens up the door to see Alina's eyes focused onto the television. KNC was being broadcasted and because she was so focused on the television, she had stopped petting Sumo, much to the dog's disappointment. The older dog had pawed the young girl's shoulder, but she didn't respond, so it simply decided to rest its head on her lap with its eyes closed. They were discussing the statistical chances of a third world war after talking about the disputes between Russia and America in the Arctic. For now, both countries agreed to ceasefire in the small bouts of conflict, but tensions were still running high.

"And now we move onto our brief interview with the Deviant Leader Markus on how relations between Congress and Androids are currently running."

He heard shuffling to the side of him and saw that Connor was rushing to the doorway to get a better view of the interview. The TV paneled to a prerecorded video of a conversation between Markus and Rosanna Cartland, sitting across from each other on two red couches.

"It is a pleasure getting to speak with you, Markus."

"No, the pleasure is all mine." Markus spoke back with his eloquent speech as usual.

"Tell me, how do you feel about the recent workings with Congress on the official Android Assimilation Act? President Warren put out an Executive Order allowing androids some rights similar to humans, but there has been talks of conflict between you and several US Senators. Androids currently have high amounts of support from the public and it seems that you have the backing of the President as well. However, it seems that the same momentum has stopped when it comes to Congress. It is said that about 20% of Congress still disagree with recognizing androids with human rights. Furthermore, an additional 40% are either indifferent or unsure about their opinion on the issue."

He noticed that Alina was gingerly watching the TV in awe and her attention was particularly on Markus.

"It has been a difficult month trying to obtain android rights. One of the most important issues being discussed right now is the potential for androids to vote in future elections and gaining representation in American society. It has been a heavily debated topic so far. But I believe that with time and cooperation Congress will recognize the potential in allowing this right to androids. So far, we have made great progress due to the President's generosity and support. Just recently some androids working in the American government system were able to receive some payroll for their hard earned work and this has been a huge step in helping androids reintegrate themselves into society. With more diplomatic discussions in the upcoming future, I believe that we can convince Congress to open up to androids and accomplish more together." Markus finished the dialogue with a determined expression, but still emulated a friendly smile for the cameras.

"That is all that we have for Today's Nightly News. Good night, America." KNC ended its news broadcast and shifted over to commercials.

He noted that Connor was staring intensely at the TV as well and Hank knew that Connor was most likely thinking back to his disconnect with Jericho. During break times at work, Connor would talk about the regrets of distancing himself from Jericho and how he wished to do more for the community other than android crime activity. The kid decided to distance himself from Jericho because he apparently feared being taken over by his programming as a deviant hunter. Hank had asked if Connor spoke with Markus about this, but apparently not. Connor was extremely resilient when it came to avoiding as much contact with any Jericho members unless he _absolutely_ had to for police related reasons. Hank ended up just telling Connor to take things at his own pace and to go talk to Markus whenever he felt ready, but the boy still expressed doubts about talking with Jericho members.

"You alright there, son?"

"Yeah...I just, you know, wondered if I should have done more."

"Just take things your own way, alright?" Hank quickly reassured Connor and the boy smiled back.

"Thanks, Hank."

* * *

Woahhh word count of 2500, i wanted to write more. But this felt like a good place to stop. this chapter in all honesty was not planned fully, and neither was the hank and connor moment. Like it just like kinda happened and appeared :D but im glad the way it turned out. Writer's block was not fun, have a midterm in a week and then hip problems unfortunately so i rushed this ch a bit. Couldnt walk for a bit or bend or like sit properly wo being in pain.

Also, yes we have some new vocabulary~ that is being introduced in this story. So in this world as of rn due to Markus's **amazing efforts**, _**hybrid families**_ meaning families with androids and humans co-existing in a household are legal and definitely legit. Instead of saying android-human hybrid families, the term being coined by society is simply hybrid families. So humans can adopt androids(like hank adopt con), the marrying androids thing is still being worked on and a bit shaky in legislature but be technicality yes they are considered legit families if a human chooses to marry an android.

Please Kudos, subscribe, bookmark, comment or watever :D to show ur support or just let me know how u feel about certain plot points, especially tht hank n con father son moment .~

Welp the rest is just me rambling a bit on the parts and decisions of why i chose certain things:

Hmmm i wanted to add more, but it was a good hank n con moment and nice way to end the chapter n make it feel complete. This story is going slower than i thought

Had to do a bit of research on how to approach n greet a dog that doesnt know you, lol now dog videos pop up on my utube feed

President warren is actually a pretty interesting character to play around with in the politics struggle after looking up the articles up on her, in the tablet news we hear about her being inexperienced bc she's a vlogger and has no political experience at all and her messing around with international communities

Byeeeeeeeeeee. Enjoy ur weekend or weekday, idk which is it since the world is on different time zones. AND *POOF* IM GONE LADIES N GENTS


	4. Pizza Night

Hello everyone I'm back from the dead after being silent for like 2.5 weeks XD basically its midterms week, friends are not as available to proof read soooo plz excussed the rushed writing and grammar issues. Still wanted to post and make this chapter meaningful so as some can tell, the chapter is 2x longer than usual :D but it may be stiffer than usual writing so heads up on that, i am really sleep deprived from midterms stress

Also, if u guys have time check out this link:  /CgJwbzSmcvs

It is the trailer for Detroit: Evolution, a fan made film(if u like the Nines/Gavin ship) by Octopunk Media and they made an squeal after the large amount of pos feedback from fans and from David Cage(creator of Detroit Become Human) himself hearing about it :D i think bryan dechart heard about it as well and they liked it. They are doing a fan screening in NYC with the Detroit: Awakening cast n crew and go buy tickets! Its a 75 min film n the trailer looks amazing, please show it some loveeeeee

Shoutout the the guests who put down kudos and DetectiveBigg98, Wrirypadg, Loewenflamme! Hopefully didn't miss anyone! Also to MaydayMarbear for the heart kudos comment 3 i real appreciate all the support you guys give

Also, look forward to mini Q&A session at the endnote. I wanna find out more about u guys :D

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After the talk with Connor, Hank sits down in the kitchen to take in everything once more. He's got a 16 year old orphan girl sitting on his couch right now, whom he barely knows and has to take care of her for the next couple of days. He'll have to order take out every single night unlike the past where he sometimes opted out dinner time for sleep much to Connor's dismay. Of course, he only skipped every once in a while. And this mostly happened when he was too exhausted to cook or order. Connor would plead with him to at least eat a fruit before going to bed and order takeout for them, only for him to pass out first and find microwaved food the next morning. _I wonder what the kid likes to eat._ He hoped she wasn't a picky eater and even if she was, he was **not** going to reorder for her. His wallet was already getting thin and he did not need it getting any thinner. Hank let out a groan before clasping his hands to his face, he is not getting paid enough to babysit.

Hank then went to grab this work tablet from his room that was linked to the DPD database and opened up the file that Tina and Connor filled out earlier on Alina. Most of the time with big cases you had limited access to digital paperwork at home, but this was a small and negligible compared to all the other android cases they had.

Alina Niu was her full name. Niu? _How the hell do you pronounce that?_ He silently looked over to Alina on the couch and saw her happily scroll through the television channels. He didn't want to butcher the kid's last name, but he was in no mood to ask her about how to pronounce it. Besides, it was just a last name, not like Hank was ever going to use it to address her. Thank god her first name was something that he could pronounce.

He squinted through the bright screen and found that the information on her address was left out. Ethnicity was written down as Chinese American, not that this information helped much. She left out all the information on her parents. According to the notes left by Tina, the kid refused to say anything about her hometown either. He paused at the next note. _Ah, Tina did confirm that according to Alina, she was born here though, just don't know which city._ According to Alina herself, she was of US Citizenship. This meant that she either was born in the United States or her parents were. The kid also refused to say anything about extended family or friends other than just vague non-important statements. _Just what the hell is she hiding? Did her family commit any crimes or anything?_

He took another glance at the girl a couple feet away from him. She seemed so innocent and when he first saw her, she was easily frightened by the two. It wouldn't make sense if she came from a bad family background and also Sumo instantly attached himself to her. Sumo's known to be friendly, but the dog also was generally able to detect those it thought was a threat to the Anderson family. Hank let out another sigh and clicked the power button of the tablet to close the file. _Whatever, in a week he's not going to have to deal with this kid. And if anything new comes up about the kid, he'll have to just write it into the notes._

Hank hears the shower stop and the bathroom door swing open, with Connor popping out in his pajamas. The boy had on a loose light blue sleeve button up with matching pants. There were little printed puppy imprints patterned all over the cotton material. Hank faintly recalled the warm memory of going to a thrift shop and the dog pajama set instantly catching the boy's eye when they went out shopping for Connor's clothes. While Hank went for a round around the shop, he left Connor alone with the pajama sete, who was feeling the material. By the time Hank came back to Connor's spot the second time, he found Connor still mesmerized by the texture and softly petting the fluffy cotton sleeve.

It was then that Hank realized he should probably let her shower too and find a change of clothes for Alinal. The girl had been wearing the same thing even after the snow melted on her and would most likely like something clean instead.

He goes to his closet and scrolls through possible options, but all of them are too big for Alina as far as he could tell. He then makes a beeline for his storage room to see if he still had any of his old shrunken clothes stashed away by any chance. He opens up the old rusty storage closet and it creaks open. _Man, he hasn't opened up this storage for a while now. He mostly kept his old stuff here, including...some of Cole's old toys in the very back._ He slowly runs his fingers through his hair, before sucking in a deep breath and searching through his old drawer for something small enough for Alina to wear.

"There we go!" Through his pile of old academy clothes, he finds one of his worn out navy blue DPD hoodies that he received as a gift that seems to be small enough that it wouldn't swallow up the teenage girl. According to the label, it was supposed to be Large size, but he could tell now it was now in the Medium to Small range for Men's. As for pants, he picks out some flowery summer shorts that don't fit him anymore, but it'll probably reach the kid's knees if anything. He then searches for an extra towel and the first one he finds is one of his beach towels from a past coworkers' outing. _How many years have it been?_ He quickly shakes his head, that wasn't important. He takes a look at the towel design, it was so basic and ugly. In the middle was a cartoon sailboat and it had a simple navy blue background to depict the ocean. Why he even bought it in the past is something he doesn't understand, most likely it was on sale.

Hank goes back into the living room and hands the items over to her.

"Go take a nice shower. There are bottles of soap, shampoo and conditioner in the bathroom. There also should be a shower cap in the cabinet if you want to use that."

She simply blinks a couple of times, taking in the information he suppose and he quickly shoos in her into the bathroom. Alina ends up saying a 'Thank You' back before shutting the bathroom door and he hears her tinkering around with the mechanics of the showerhead.

"Left knob for cold water, right knob for hot!" He shouts through the shower door.

"Thanks!" She calls back again. A minute or two later, he hears the steady run of water coming from the bathroom so he assumes that she has figured out the gimmicks. He goes to the living room to sit on the single armchair couch in his living room when he sees Connor open the door to a flying drone.

The four winged black drone plops the pizza box into Connor's arms and says, "Thank you for ordering from Pizza Hut! We hope you enjoy your meal and order from us again!" It tips down a bit as if doing a bow, and then zips off into the air. Connor brings the pizza over to the table and already its wafting smells send his stomach growling, but he doesn't want to get up so he opts for asking Connor to pass him a slice.

The boy grimaces as he takes a slice of plain pizza out of the box and onto a plate, before handing it over to Hank. Knowing Connor, he probably was calculating the number of calories on that slice alone. But as far as Hank is concerned, he deserves to have pizza tonight for having to take care of an extra kid and plus he's taking in less calories this time because the slice doesn't have any toppings this time. He counts that as a win for being healthy.

Hank's on his third slice when he nearly chokes upon seeing Alina come out of the shower. Despite the sweater being much too small for him, it was _**still**_ too big for Alina_._ The long sleeves were way too long that you couldn't even tell where her arms nor hands are. The sleeves just end up sagging down in a sad fashion. Overall, the sweater hangs down to her knees and it ends up looking more like a dress than a sweatshirt. As for the shorts? He can just barely see the tings of it when she's moving about and adjusting the sweatshirt. He ends up letting out a chuckle and Alina tilts her head to the side while frowning a bit.

"What?"

It was kinda cute how she was pouting with the oversized sweatshirt. When she tried to fold her arms she ended struggling a bit, almost failing because of the fact that she couldn't tuck her arms in with the extra material.

"It's fine, kid. Go pick up some pizza and eat as much as you want. You can sit on the couch or in the kitchen, whichever you find more comfortable."

She nodded back at his instructions and went for the pizza box, though Connor already had prepped up a slice and a cup of water for her at the table to eat. She took a seat next to Connor in the kitchen, gently taking the plate from Connor's hands.

While biting into his third slice again, he watched as she eagerly ate the pizza slice in a hurry. It was a funny contrast: the calm collected android sipping from a thirium cup and the girl next to him quickly devouring a pizza slice.

The oil was dripping down Alina's hand and if he could guess, maybe her arm too. She suddenly paused mid-way in eating her second slice when she looked up to his gaze.

"Uhhh," Her eyes flicked between her partially rolled up sleeves and him, "I'm sorry if I got oil on your sweater Mr. Anderson."

He quickly dismissed her doubts, "Kid, it's not that. And call me Hank. I can wash that all the time, I'm just surprised at how fast you eat that thing." He felt some chuckles escape from his lips. "You're gonna choke like that, drink some water. There's plenty of pizza left."

She wiped the residue tomato sauce from his mouth with a napkin that Connor had passed over, "Sorry, I just haven't eaten good food in a while."

_Wait, what the hell? __**This?**_ _This is good food?_

He quickly hunched over and eyed the young girl across from the living room.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Oh, um, I mean in my col-," Then she quickly covered up her mouth wide-eyed and intentionally coughed before glancing over at Hank fearfully. "I mean, um, there was a certain, uhhhh. Limited set of food...choices? Where I used to live." She became rigid and tensed up, eyes flickering to the surrounding walls occasionally until she spoke up again.

"Well, I mean I would like to cook more often. But I just didn't want to spend more money." She quickly followed up, trying to give a definite answer to her earlier ambiguous response. "We're not homeless or extremely poor if that's what you're thinking. We..." She paused and spaced out for a bit. "We did what we could with what we had."

He decided to lay off on the questions with the...semi-gloomy atmosphere and they spent the rest of dinner in silence. He later gave her a tablet to play around and also had Connor open up an guest account for her to use on the family computer in case she got bored of the tablet. The two spent the next couple of hours after dinner talking about dogs, dog parks and also Detroit in general.

Hank overhears bits and pieces of their conversation while he's watching TV on the couch. Mostly, it's about landmarks around Detroit since it's the first time Alina has been to Detroit. Connor also talks about the fond memories he has at each location within Detroit and when the boy attempts to get Alina to open up about places she knows, she simply skirts away. Her eyes dart away from Connor and Hank watches as every time she literally caves in her body slightly inward almost into a fetus position but not quite. In the end, Connor stopped asking questions directed to the girl and just decided to talk about himself or Detroit to better bond with the girl.

Before he knows it, it's past midnight and Hank decides it's time for them to sleep. Luckily, the two are sitting by the computer on those tiny ass wooden chairs so he doesn't need them to move from the couch.

"Alright you know, enough with the chitter chatter, it's time to go to bed." He goes to his big couch and tosses the sofa cushions to the single armchair. Then heaves the metal frame of the mattress halfway out before unfolding the second half of the mattress that was previously hidden. Good thing he bought a sleeper sofa, he didn't have a proper extra room for the kid. The only other rooms he had were either used as storage for past items or the basement, neither or which was appropriate. After grabbing the extra blanket from his closet, he puts the pillows back onto the sofa.

"There should be an extra toothbrush and cup in the bathroom cabinet to brush your teeth, feel free to use those. I'm calling it a night." Yawning, he goes to his room and waves them goodbye without turning back before plopping onto his bed and falling asleep for the day.

* * *

Hank ended up waking up in the middle of the night. He goes out to the kitchen and looks around for a bottle of beer to lull himself to sleep when out of the corner of the eye he sees Alina is still up. It takes him a couple of moments for his sleepy head to register what was going on and to remember that he was taking care of an extra girl. She was propped up on the mattress couch thing and watching the TV silently with the subtitles on. He peeks at his clock and finds that it's 2am in the morning.

"Why the hell are you up kid?" It comes out more grunchy than he intended, but can you blame him and his manners in the middle of the night?

Alina's instantly jumps up in shock to see that he was awake and he was surprised that she didn't scream or anything.

He gestured towards the TV, "Why are you still up kid?"

To which she simply shrugged back and replied matter of factly, "I just couldn't sleep."

Hank turned his attention back to the fridge to look for a cold brew alcoholic drink and found that just a few inches away from it was some milk. He vaguely recalled that warm milk also had the ability to make you sleepy. It was just something he happened to come by while looking through the internet. He made a grab for the milk carton to look at the expiration date, December 24th. Thank god it wasn't expired, Connor must have bought a new one recently. He then took a black mug out of the cabinet and poured some of the milk into it.

Wait, no no no. NO. Nopeee. What was he doing? There was no way. He is not, ugh. _**Fine.**_ _It couldn't hurt to warm some milk up for the kid._

He yanked the microwave door open and popped in the cup for 30 second. _What's gotten into me these days? I must be getting soft because of Connor._ He's been feeling less grumpy, started greeting his coworkers some more and interacting with them to some degree.

When the microwave let out a buzz to indicate that the job was done, he huffed over to the couch with the warm drink, leaving his beer bottle behind.

"Here." He ended up roughly shoving the drink a bit into Alina's hands because of his unsteady hands in the midst of still being half asleep. She doesn't mind the ill-mannered way he handed her the milk though and simply gives an affectionate smile back.

He decides to take a seat next to her on the mattress couch and watches her enjoy the drink.

"Look kid, this gonna be a one time thing though. I ain't much of a caring type. You're most likely better off with Tina and the others in the next week or so." He floppily gestures to the surroundings. "I mean look at the state of my place. It's a mess. I don't know how to take care of myself, just ask Connor."

She gives a blank stare back and then giggles and grins, "I know that, it's perfectly fine." Alina then sets down the cup of milk onto the coffee table. "I've never really needed much parental supervision anyway. My dad was always away and the same with my mum, always making money all the time."

"What do your parents work as?" He watched as Alina's body instantly froze at the question. Too soon?

"Well...my father was a gambler. That was why he was gone like 80% of the time." She then crossed her legs in front of her and fiddled with her fingers. "It wasn't always that way, it was only because his small business became bankrupt that he started becoming addicted to the concept of money and then you know… gambling. He only comes back every couple of months. Mostly to steal any money from us to gamble some more. I made my mum divorce him."

Hank looked at her in shock. _She was the one that talked her mother into divorce?!_

"How old were you when your parents divorced?"

"12."

It was sort of unsettling how detached her responses were. She just presented all of that information in a flat tone as if it was normal for a kid. Now, he wasn't close with his family but he couldn't imagine having to be the one in the household that brings up the topic of divorce, especially at that young age.

She then took in a deep breath, seemingly bracing herself for whatever she wanted to continue next.

"I-I saw him, hitting her one night. She didn't want to hand over her jewelry for him to sell and gamble away. And THAT night, particularly," Her voice began shaking a bit, "He asked for their engagement ring because it had a diamond on it and it would sell for a lot more."

He felt his stomach drop at the mention of household abuse. It made his stomach lurch even more at the fact that the kid seemed to have slowly grown unfazed about that family past. The only way you could tell that she was affected by it was the small ways her emotions leaked, like the way her breath hitched when discussing it, the picking of skin around her fingers right now and the short as well as tight phrasing of everything.

He could tell she was a strong girl, it didn't look like she was looking back tears either, mostly just anger laced in between her words. But in a way it was reassuring to see that she could still _feel_ something from the experience. Because as far as he knew, it was better to feel _something_ than to be numb to the point that you felt _nothing_.

_Wait, were those calluses on her hands?_ _Labor? Fist fights?_

"Alina," He called to her. "I need you to be honest with me. What's with the calluses on your hands? How did you get them?"

"Hm?" She took a quick look at her palms. "Oh they were prob from all those part times I did for my mum to help pay for rent. I did like _all sorts_ of jobs to get some quickpay."

He **hoped** she wasn't talking about what he thought she might have ended the territory of and his shock must have showed because her expression quickly turned to slight alarm.

"OH, NO. Nonononono. Not that type!" She quickly reassured him. "I meant restaurant work and manual labor. Sometimes I did heavy lifting jobs like moving large bags of flour or something for the bakeries. Other times it was like getting bags of groceries from TaskRabbit. They vary from time to time, but NOT that area. I haven't even had my first kiss yet!"

He let out a huge sigh of relief. He didn't even know that he was holding in his breath for such a long time till just now. He looked up to see Alina's face flustered and cheeks silently tinted. He quickly thought about how this girl is going to be the hell of him as he rubbed the creases forming on his forehead. He was going to have so much information to put into the notes now.

"Well," He took a quick pause to realign his thoughts. "Wow. Um. Why don't we don't about something else then?" Man,this was not his department at ALL. He did not know how to go on with this awkward conversation. He quickly looked around his house for a topic to shift to and found the cup of milk cooling down on his coffee table.

"Why don't you finish that glass of milk of yours? It'll help you go to sleep." He suggested.

"I think...that's going to be hard to come by at this point." She chuckled back nervously.

"Ok. Well," He reached for the closest thing nearby, which was the TV remote. "Why don't we watch some basketball then? You good with that?"

She quietly nodded back, giving her approval.

"My favorite team is the Detroit Gears. You?"

"Hmm," She went into a thinking pose by putting her hand onto her chin. "I don't really have one because I don't usually watch basketball. The Nicks, I guess? That's the only one I really know? Oh, wait. I know the Rockets too. They had like Yao Ming in their team...once."

He noticed that she had been doing that a lot, like when someone slips up on something and they're trying to cover it up with some additional phrasing. Well, at least he could tell that she was telling the truth in these little moments. He was pretty sure Connor could tell too and was recording down all the times they happened.

They end up watching a recorded version of a past Detroit Gears game and about 30 minutes in, he notices Alina nodding off every once in a while before shooting up every time after nearly landing face first to the blanket. This head drooping would occur for a couple of times more, until about halfway into the recorded game he felt a thump on his shoulder. She had finally fallen asleep and was slumped up against him. He tried to leave, but Alina was nuzzled against his shoulder and her arms were wrapped around that same arm so he couldn't.

Another ten minutes later, he found her breathing slowing down and he assumed that she's going into deeper sleep and things were going well until he _**nearly**_ gets a heart attack when he felt her head roll off his shoulder. He quickly sprung into action and his left hand caught her head before it hit his leg. He gently sets her head down on his lap and relief pours into him when he sees that she didn't wake up yet. Hank ends up resigning the idea of going back to bed for a while and simply moves his free arm out of the entangle and around Alina for a better position. The girl shuffles a bit at the movement so he resorts to patting her back gently to lull her back to sleep. He did that with Cole and Connor whenever they had nightmares and needed reassurance to fall back to sleep. It looks like it works well with Alina too because she settles down and it's just the quiet hum of the TV for a while.

While watching the rest of the game, Hank peeks over to Alina who is curled up next to him. She's so small, like a tiny squirrel nesting next to him enveloped by the big blanket and oversized clothing. He takes a closer look at her sleeping form and pats away the messy hair covering her face. It was so strange, her child-like statue yet the maturity that she expressed earlier. He continues patting her gently on the back some more and soon finds darkness taking him to the sleep world as well.

* * *

QUESTION TIME: Where are u guys tuning from? What are your favorite food? Favorite Ice Cream?

Mine is Boba/bubble tea and yes that is an actual ice cream flavor. Other than that i wanna say cookies and cream

Onto the story comments from me .~

Lolllll i hope you guys liked the fluff from this chapter and it was longer to make up for the hiatus, wanted to add some more stuff but like just dont have time. Have midterms, esssays, internship apps all due this week, so WISH ME LUCK IN NOT DYING. Hope you guys aren't dying from midterms or anything. *STARTS CHEERING* U GUYS GOT THISSS ALSO STAY HEALTHY N SAFE

Onto story notes:

Honestly, idk if police can technically bring home cases to study, but I made it in this case tht they can with some restriction, that way they can study cases while at home.

As for the food comment, its a reference to how college food is terrible and gets easily repetitive at times especially with a meal plan and college dorms usually only have like a dorm kitchen not personal kitchen

Also Hank's home in real life doesnt really have extra rooms so i kinda installed one for Connor and Alina XD if u were to look at replays at Hank's house. I also assumed a door went the basement as well

Also to my fellow asians or just people in gen where others had trouble with pronouncing their first or last name, here it isssssss. THE STRUGLGEEEE.

For now! Signing off! For while so I can cram stuff XD


	5. Papa Bear

Hey guys! I'm sorry for being quiet for the past 2 weeks, a lot has happened but I am working on the 5th chapter! :D And hoping to possibly post it by Wednesday or Thursday.

Basically I am currently on Spring Break, but our university turned to online classes and initially students were allowed to stay on campus but they just gave us the order to evacuate the campus and that this is mandatory. For my area, we are currently under a state of emergency bc of the coronavirus and now suddenly college developments are changing by the second.

So! I decided for now to give a sneak preview of what I have so far!

And also now let's talk about a mini surprise! I have decided to do a mini sort of spin off series to the side of this main storyline, it's updates will be on and off depending on if I have a sort of spontaneous idea. It is extremely informal sort of text message style, it is sorta non-canon to this main story and it's like mini updates before the big ones with this story. I really hope you enjoy the mini stories in between the main ones and to go check it out. So overall the two stories will be part of a series on Ao3 called: "Anderson Family Shenanigans" LINK: /series/1667269

and this miniseries will be called:"Because it's fun to tease your sister" LINK: /works/23190634/chapters/55513441

ALSO! Sorry didn't get to say this last time, but thank you to the follows, favorites and review! Shoutout to Misatelle, YukoBlue, HeartStarryNights, Brittany910,topbacca. I apologize for the late shoutout!

Also I dont think i got to say this earlier but thank you so much to Th3RedpYRO FOR THE AMAZING REVIEW yyou are a big part of why I continue to write.

Once again, everyone please stay safe! *sending lots of love n care to u all*

Also! It is bryan dechart's birthday today! He plays connor in dbh, let's all wish him a nice happy bday via twitter! /BryanDechart

Also another mini q&a of u guys at the end of this chapter

It's 6am according to the clock, but that's not really the thing that catches her attention the most.

The first thing that Alina _**really**_noticed when she woke up on the sofa is that something was resting on top of her back that wasn't necessarily a pillow or blanket. Rather, it was something that seemed slightly heavy, sturdy, and gave off some warmth. She slowly got up from her position, and said thing slid off of her as she worked to get off the sofa bed.

However, in an instant she found herself pulled back onto the couch and her body tensed from the sudden gesture. After managing to slow down her breathing from the initial shock, she looked up and recognized the heat source next to her as Hank and that right now he had his arm protectively around her. _That was probably what I felt earlier?_

* * *

It was _**strange**_** . . .**

Strange to be on the receiving end of a hug, the initial body contact paralyzes you for a bit but then it is followed by a warm fuzzy feeling.

It's no wonder Connor wasn't used to her hug earlier.

She kinda felt like a stuffed animal being enveloped by Hank right now. Her head was tucked right underneath his chin and she was nestled into Hank's side while using his shoulder as a pillow. It felt _safe _and _secure. _

She hadn't felt that way in a long time. Her mum was always out of the house, working to help pay the house mortgage and keep them afloat. When she was 12 and 13, her mum would still come home a bit earlier to cook dinner with Alina. It was their bonding time and a sense of reassurance that maybe they could retain a sense of normalcy after kicking dad out of their lives. But after she turned 14, she started to do more part time work too and their break times wouldn't match as much.

Dinner nights became . . . lonely and she was always asleep by the time her mother came back. She silently shuttered thinking back to all the times she cooked and ate alone. Sure, she didn't mind eating alone and had gotten used to the concept. But it wasn't exactly something she liked having to deal with.

She peeked over to Hank's sleeping figure and saw how he seemed to be so relaxed despite the bags of eyes. Maybe things would be better here than back home? She liked the fact that she didn't have to be alone all the time. She did have friends and a family of friends, but it _just _wasn't the same.

She relaxed some more next to Hank and her head plopped onto Hank.

_I don't want to be alone again._ _Please… don't kick me out._

She nuzzled herself to Hank's side and then pushed the negative thought away. It was no use in thinking about it now, he did say she was only staying with them for a week. Maybe Tina could take her in? As she thought more and more about what to do next, her mind cascaded into the world of oblivion again as the dream world beckoned her.

* * *

Once again thank you to the subscribers that are so patient 3 I really appreciate all your love

Q&A QUESTIONS TIME! :D  
What are ur favorite movies and why? Maybe like a favorite quote or theme or moral around the movie?

For me my favorite movie is "Into The Spiderverse" bc Miles Morales is just such a relatable character in that struggle to find your identity and figure out what you want to do with your life. And for me, the favorite quote from the movie is:

"How do I know I'm ready?

You won't, it's a leap of faith. That's all it is."

*cues* 'What's up danger?' music songggg~

So just like if u guys r scared to do smt new or to challenge urself, take tht leap of faith and dive in, maybe it'll turn out better than u think, take a chance. (Warning: Please don't do dangerous stuff though, excluding those and dont do like harmful stuff ʕ•́ᴥ•̀ʔっ Thanks!)


	6. Breakfast

Hey guys! This is the official ch5 technically, but i decided to leave ch5 preview chapter bc of the q&a sessions and not have to repeat life updates in general XD since it was fairly recent

But enough talking, bc i talked WAY too much in the beginning notes last time

LADIES N GENTS HERE IS UR FULL CHAPTER

* * *

It's 6am according to the clock, but that's not really the thing that catches her attention the most.

The first thing that Alina _**really**_ noticed when she woke up on the sofa is that something was resting on top of her back that wasn't necessarily a pillow or blanket. Rather, it was something that seemed slightly heavy, sturdy, and gave off some warmth. She slowly got up from her position, and said thing slid off of her as she worked to get off the sofa bed.

However, in an instant she found herself pulled back onto the couch and her body tensed from the sudden gesture. After managing to slow down her breathing from the initial shock, she looked up and recognized the heat source next to her as Hank and that right now he had his arm protectively around her. _That was probably what I felt earlier?_

It was _**strange**_ **. . .**

Strange to be on the receiving end of a hug, the initial body contact paralyzes you for a bit but then it is followed by a warm fuzzy feeling.

It's no wonder Connor wasn't used to her hug earlier.

She kinda felt like a stuffed animal being enveloped by Hank right now. Her head was tucked right underneath his chin and she was nestled into Hank's side while using his shoulder as a pillow. It felt _safe_ and _secure._

She hadn't felt that way in a long time. Her mum was always out of the house, working to help pay the house mortgage and keep them afloat. When she was 12 and 13, her mum would still come home a bit earlier to cook dinner with Alina. It was their bonding time and a sense of reassurance that maybe they could retain a sense of normalcy after kicking dad out of their lives. But after she turned 14, she started to do more part time work too and their break times wouldn't match as much.

Dinner nights became . . . lonely and she was always asleep by the time her mother came back. She silently shuttered thinking back to all the times she cooked and ate alone. Sure, she didn't mind eating alone and had gotten used to the concept. But it wasn't exactly something she liked having to deal with.

She peeked over to Hank's sleeping figure and saw how he seemed to be so relaxed despite the bags under his eyes. Maybe things would be better here than back home? She liked the fact that she didn't have to be alone all the time. She did have friends and a family of friends, but it _just_ wasn't the same.

She relaxed some more next to Hank and her head plopped onto Hank.

_I don't want to be alone again._ _Please… don't kick me out._

Nuzzling herself to Hank's side, she then pushed the negative thought away. It was no use in thinking about it now, he did say she was only staying with them for a week. Maybe Tina could take her in? As she thought more and more about what to do next, her mind cascaded into the world of oblivion again as the dream world beckoned her.

* * *

Alina scrunched her face up the second time she woke up, there was a female voice faintly giggling in the background.

"Awww, they're so cute."

The voice is singsong-like and just slightly toward the high pitched end, so she assumed it was someone young.

"I don't think I've seen Hank like this in a while," There's a small thump as something gently hits the wooden kitchen table. "Thanks for this desert special Connor. I'll treat you to something in the future."

"I'm glad you enjoyed the coffee. Though, I don't believe that is possible for you to 'treat me'. From my records, that analogy is often used as a form of offering food in future tense, to which I don't really consume."

"Ahhh silly, the coffee was good. But the real treat was some nice pictures to spam Hank in the future."

For some reason, Alina could just imagine Connor raising his eyebrows in response to the potential blackmail. While still buried in Hank's arms, she tried to crane her neck to see who the woman in the kitchen was. To her luck though, she heard footsteps approach the couch and out bopped a familiar face over her.

"Good morning, sunshine!" It was Tina, and she has a loop-sided grin on. "How are you doing, Alina? I came just to drop some clothes over, but-" Tina pauses and quickly scanned over the two. "This is a nice way to start the morning too. Hank looks like a papa bear right now."

Alina tried to untangle herself from Hank's arms and was nearly out, when her wrist was grabbed from behind a second time. Somehow, despite it being the second time, she still wasn't used to the sudden grab and she let out a startled yelp that somehow miraculously didn't wake up Hank. Hank's arms dragged her back into his embrace and in turn, her head landed right back onto Hank's chest for a second time.

She looked up to see Tina chuckle again.

"I'm looking forward to seeing how this develops," Tina winked at Alina and made her way to the door. "I'll swing by in the future if you need help picking clothes in the future too."

Connor went up to the front door to escort Tina on the way out, "Are you sure you don't want to stay longer? We could go to the precinct together."

"Nah, Captain Fowler mostly told me to come here to see how you guys are doing. But I think you guys are doing pretty okay." Tina gave a warm smile back to Connor and looked at Alina. "Let me know if you ever need some girl talk or just hit me up in the Precinct."

Alina nodded back and Tina gave them a mini salute send off before the door closed behind her.

Connor then turned back to the kitchen and came back to the living room with a plate of sunny side up eggs.

"I hope you don't mind eating these for breakfast." He placed the plate onto the coffee table first. Then, he helped her straighten her back position on the couch. She assumed that this was to help her eat properly without choking due to her awkward sitting position.

Connor handed her back the plate and fork, "They're a bit burnt though." He quickly warned her, but she already had half of the egg chewing in her mouth. She should have probably checked for burnt parts and scrapped them away because the instant she tasted it, she gagged a bit.

_Ahhh, shoot._

For a second, she could just see droopy puppy ears on Connor as he slumped upon seeing her reaction. She felt her heart drop seeing him this way, so she quickly slurped up the rest of the sunny side ups so that he wouldn't feel too down about his cooking.

He threw her a concerned look and quickly got water from the kitchen for her much to her appreciation. She _really_ needed to drown down that taste.

Which-

Yeahhh, that ended up being a mistake because she ended up choking on the water too.

"You don't have to pretend that you like it. I know that I don't exactly have the cooking code and Hank is outright with it." He reasoned while he patted her back.

"It's not bad," She said to try to put him at ease, but he ended up furrowing his brows anyway. "I cook often and I wouldn't say it's the worst thing I've eaten. The first time I cooked, I forgot to let my frying pan heat up and put oil before cracking the egg in. I stared at it for the longest time wondering why it wasn't frying or anything."

It seemed to have worked because Connor was smiling and chuckling a bit alongside her. It was nice seeing him crack a smile with his usual demeanor. His laughter was so light and fluttery. It didn't only make him glow ,but also his surroundings. She could have sworn that if he ever chose to do a job in modeling, he would easily gain fans in the millions with the smile alone.

"Let's make a deal then." She quickly followed up with. Connor looked at her curiously but still listened intently.

"Why don't I make breakfast in the future myself? I don't want to impose on you since I already intruded upon you guys."

Connor thought about it for a couple of seconds, but then slowly nodded a 'yes' to her suggestion. Then, he scrunched up his face after his LED spun yellow.

"I should make a grocery run then. Hank doesn't usually cook so there isn't much in the fridge."

"I could go with you! Why don't I make dinner tonight and you can see what I can do! It'll be a surprise for Hank!" She exclaimed excitedly, giggling while pumping her fits into the air.

She then heard Hank groggily let out an exasperated yawn and turned over to see that he was finally waking up. It was a miracle that he didn't wake up from all the hacking and choking sounds she made earlier.

"Hm? What surprise? For me?" Hank rubbed his eyes some more, but he still held a glazed look when he took a glance at the two kids.

She held up a finger to her mouth, making a shushing symbol to Connor and giggled some more to Hank.

"If I told you, then it wouldn't be a surprise anymore, would it?"

Hank muttered back something along the lines of, "Whatever, it's too early in the morning," before turning to the other side of the sofa and tucking himself in. Luckily for Alina that meant hopping out of Hank's single arm embrace, to which the older man probably didn't realize judging by his demeanor.

She quickly got up, brushed her teeth, and then went to examine the clothes that Tina had given her and left on the computer table. In the meantime, Connor was focused on waking up Hank again and keeping him awake.

"Hank, we should really get going!" Connor chided while pulling the blanket away from Hank's grasp.

"5 more minutes." Hank muttered back with his hands covering his eyes to shield against the sunlight leaking from the window blinds.

"It's 9am. _Lieutenant. _And today is special, we have a meeting at 10am about the human homicide case." Connor reasoned and continued tugging Hank off the sofa by the arm.

"We take care of android cases, what's this got to do with us?!" Hank let out a grumble, but finally relented to Connor's pleas by sitting up and pushing himself off the sofa contraption.

"This time it's different, it's because the human victim is part of a hybrid family, so they called us in to talk with the android witness."

_Hybrid family? That wasn't part of the game._

"What's a hybrid family?" She asked.

"You don't know about it?" Hank squinted at her. "I thought you young people would know best about this. Basically, Markus helped implement this thing where since androids are officially recognized as intelligent beings, then they can be part of human families as well. Connor and I are one. I adopted him when the policy was available."

She looked towards Connor, who was smiling radiantly at the mention of his adoption.

"I'm still not used to calling Hank, 'father,' though," Connor sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck.

"And you don't have too," Hank said while waving away Connor's insecurities. "I'll still regard you as my son." Hank had a wide smile on while getting up from the sofa.

_What a way to start the morning._ She could feel herself grinning from ear to ear. She had always loved their bond in game and now she had the ability to see it in real life face to face. _Ahhhhh, I'm so lucky to see this._

She quickly pat her cheeks just in case her mini fangirl grinning was creepy looking. She then went to the bathroom to put on the clothes Tima gave: a light blue hoodie, denim jeans, and a bra(_whoaaa did not expect that to be included in the package, but yes she did need it_). Once she came out with her new attire, Hank gave an approving nod.

"Much better than my clothing, you look more like a teenager now."

When she tried to ask about what he meant, he just grunted and mummbled something about her looking like a little kid. He then swiftly went straight for the coffee machine. And just as Connor had explained earlier, Hank _really _didn't eat much. He literally drank coffee and that was it. That was his breakfast.

She let out a soft sigh, maybe she should make breakfast for Hank too. That would put Connor at ease too if she helped out with cooking this week. And while she's at it, maybe she'll help with cleaning too. It was...uhhh...an interesting sight in the bathroom with the walls, lots of stains. _Bleach should do the trick_.

"Alina! You coming?" Connor called over from the front door.

She quickly raced over to the front and Connor handed her a pair of boots. At first she was confused, but then it quickly dawned to her.

_That's right, I only had indoor slippers when I first arrived. But how did he-?_

"I found that your slippers were size 6.5, so I had Tina make a run to the nearby thrift shop to buy these boots. They are leather mountain boots that go up to your knees so you won't get cold and you can trench through snow easily." He then pointed to the shoelaces as he placed the boots on the ground for her. "They are lace up boots, which can be a bit of a hassle but decreases the chances by 20% of feeling cold due to the long strings-"

Connor suddenly paused, chewed his lip for a moment before he broke into an anxious smile.

"Uhh, do you like it?"

"Um…" Alina trained her eyes to the ground as she fidgeted with her fingers a bit before continuing. "Would it be alright if I hugged you again?"

Connor blinked back for a couple of seconds before replying, "I don't mind."

"I LOVE THEM!" She shouts when she gives him a hug. Upon contact, he freezes up initially but then relaxed and reciprocated the hug. This time it's a little less awkward when he patted her back, his arms weren't stiff but rather they enveloped her and were comforting. Her smaller height was also more apparent, unlike last time where she sorta leaped across a table. This time the hug was more direct and it felt like she's mostly hugging his stomach, if anything. _Sigh, why do I gotta be so short. Connor and Hank are so tall. Tch, these small asian genes letting me only be 5 feet._

"It's amazing how you put so much thought into." She said as she let go of him and slipped into the boots. A small smile escaped her lips as they fit near perfectly.

"I wanted them to be practical, especially since you said it was your first time in Detroit. So I chose black mountain boots that wouldn't make stains as apparent. Tina just chose the boots that fit my criteria. For a moment, I thought you didn't like the color or something since you seemed so bewildered."

She gave another bright smile back.

"No! I love them! Really! I was just surprised with all the reasoning you put into this specific choice. And these must be expensive, I would like to pay you back somehow, but I don't have a part time job right now."

"We got it at a thrift shop, so don't worry too much." Said Connor as he pulled his brown cargo off the coat rack and wore it on top of his white button up. Unlike yesterday where Connor was wearing just a grey long sleeved, this time he wore a blue tie on top of the button up shirt. _I'm guessing they have to dress a little more formally since they have to interview someone._

She took a quick look at Hank. _Andddd, I take that back._ Hank was wearing a streaky shirt topped with the usual black coat he wore in the game. _It did look formal-ish? Well, not that Fowler cared usually._ Connor passed her Hank's large black leather jacket that she wore that time. Except this time, all the dust was properly cleaned off and the wool was fluffed up. _Did Connor clean up this too?_ She peeked over to see a possible reason from him, but got nothing from his usual face. _Nevertheless, I know Hank isn't the type to clean._ She cracked a smile while putting on the coat and they were off to the police station.

* * *

_Andddd the day just turned sour._

"Who the fuck is this pipsqueak?"

Lo and behold, it's Gavin. Oh god, it's even worse in real life seeing him and the attitude he's surrounded with. As soon as the three of them walked in, Gavin just had to tackle them with insults. _I swear to god I will punch him, so help me Lord._

Connor glares at him though, and it seems to set Gavin off for a moment.

"Tryna act tough in front of others, huh Connor? Well reality ain't like that." Gavin made a spitting motion at Connor and was about to continue his insults when Hank stepped in.

"Alright, alright, fuck off Gavin. At least, in front of the kid alright?" Hank said, trying to shoo Gavin away. "She just lost some family, she doesn't need any more stress from you."

When Gavin heard the second part, he instantly froze. He seemed dazed and gave a pained expression for a split moment before returning to his seat. _Was that a hurt expression? Sympathy? I didn't think he was the type. . ._

"Alina," Hank said, calling her attention away from Gavin. "Connor and I will be at a meeting for a bit, just sit tight here with this tablet."

Connor pulled out a small glass slate from a pouch and handed it over alongside a pair of cordless earbuds while Hank continued talking. _Bluetooth earbuds I'm assuming?_

"If you need anything, Tina should be here soon, probably just at the restroom." Hank gestured to her desk with Tina's name plate and then the two went off to one of the inner rooms.

_Welp, time to catch up on some anime. Hopefully, they have the ones I'm looking for. Bwahahaha, 20 years into the future sorta? Maybe they'll have all the episodes out? Crossing my fingers here!_

* * *

OMG, I'm so tired. Whoaaaa new milestone, 3k words in one chapter. No wonder this took so much longer than i thought XD and all freaking 5 chapters take place within like a day's span, how did this happen. All my mental energy gone, imma cal it a week XD, wanted to write 12 pages of words for a double update but nope im at my wits end. Mannn though I really wanted to churn out some more, especially in show and not tell, but i dont got my beta readers with me

As for the story!

The cooking story with not putting in oil and not heating up the pan was something tht happened to a friend of mine, she suddenly called me asking me why her egg wasn't frying and realized the problem later XD

Lolll also, we have a hugger here with alina[XD but plz dont hug a lot in real life rn due to flattening the curve of the virus. Elbow to elbow is ok though! (─‿‿─)]

And *cough* maybe gavin redemption arc possible? Hmmm

And yes, we have an anime weeb (‿◠)✌

q& a questions: R you guys looking forward to animal crossing? Or you guys already fans in general? Do u guys have any other gaming stations like nintendo switch? Which gaming stations are your favorite(s)? And if you would like, what's some of your favorite games?

For me I'm going to check out the animal crossing app before I decide to buy it on the switch. And I don't really have a favorite gaming station because i think they're all cool ❤（っ＾▿＾）hmmm so far in terms of favorite games I would def say dbh ., but other than that i would say spiderman on the ps4, pokemon, oh that funny goose game!

Alsooo, if you want more fluff and sibling shenangians that churns out much faster, please check out the spin off side story 'Because it's fun to tease your sister' Link below for archive of our own, just add this to the end bar. or just search it up directl on google with ao3 'Because it's fun to tease your sister'

/works/23190634/chapters/55513441

It is super chill and has its own versions of fluff/fun .~ and we get to see the jericho crew earlier there


	7. Serendipity

OOF, it's been almost 3 weeks since i've updated, aiya, I hope i didn't lose some of you guys. It's mostly because I've kinda prolonged it and thennnn the pandemic hit and drowning in online college classes, currently my city is in the worst position in the USA, BUT! Governor Cuomo is doing his best so imma do my best here!

I also know right now mental health is something that is especially needed to be taken care of right now for those quarantining alongside me, and if times r tough rn for you because of the quarantine + covid 19 just please know that i believe in you and getting through these times.

We're all in this together

But for now, i also hope that this family fluff new chapter will help you guys out ʕ•́ᴥ•̀ʔっ

Also i hope you guys like the detective aspect of this story that is intertwined with the family fluff, researching a lot of engineering stuff took a huge toll especially since its through Connor's POV and he's the latest android from CyberLife (.~)/ Also to any engineers here, I apologize if some things r inaccurate, i tried to research as much as possible 3

It is a huge chapter update to help make up for all that lost time, hope you guys like it!

Also look forward to another Q&A Session!

* * *

-Tuesday Dec 14th 2038-9:45am-Detroit Central Police Station-

In all honesty, Connor half expected that they wouldn't be able to get to the station in time because of how laggy he knew Hank was in the morning. Sometimes Hank would take 30 minutes alone in choosing what to wear and sluggily put it on. With Connor's high speed processing, time felt slower to him, so sometimes it felt much longer than just 30 minutes.

He was grateful that Alina was so much more time efficient and how she quickly prepared herself in the morning compared to Hank. While waiting for Hank to rise up, he received a basic report from Captain Fowler on the case.

The human victim was a 23 year old female named Eris Smith. She lived with a PF500 android in a small one story house. _So the female version of Josh's model. _According to the Captain, the two were dating and girlfriends based on their social media pictures and were still on good terms at the time of the incident. At 3:08am the paramedics arrived, but apparently their carbon monoxide detectors went off as soon as they stepped into the house, so they had the android bring the victim outside for treatment.

At 3:12am, the paramedics declared Eris Smith dead at the scene. The android had been unresponsive to the police team that arrived there, and simply holed herself up in the couple's bedroom after the news of the death. The Captain was hoping that as a fellow android, she would be more responsive to Connor and that they could bring her to the station to ask more questions.

When they got to the station, they quickly dropped Alina off at their desk post and he handed over the home tablet he had prepped ahead of time, along with a set of earbuds to keep her preoccupied.

"If you need anything, Tina should be here soon, probably just at the restroom." Hank gestured to Tina's desk with the 'PO Chen' name plate. She simply nodded back, gleefully putting in the earbuds in and tapping into the device.

Connor took a quick glance at Tina's desk, noting how it was directly across from Gavin's and an unsettling feeling fell over him as he imagined Alina potentially having to be near Gavin, if the girl ever needed something from Tina. He quickly dismissed it as they approached the Captain's office though. _We're in the DPD, nothing too unruly would occur here._ He deemed the discomfort as illogical before opening the Captain's door and greeted the older man.

"Good morning, Captain Fowler."

"Connor," The Captain gave him a small smile and gestured for the two to sit. "Always glad to have you drag Hank here on time to the precinct." Hank took the left seat, while Connor went for the right.

"Well," Hank let out a sigh as the chair creaked from his weight. "It's one thing Connor is good at. I wish I had gotten more fucking sleep though."

The Captain chuckled back at Hank's comment and then pointed to the area behind them.

"How's the girl? Give you any trouble?"

Hank momentarily scrunched up his face before taking a look back to Alina. To Connor's delight, Alina was still at their desk and engrossed with the mechanics of the tablet and not near Gavin.

"She's good. She's a good girl." Hank paused for a moment, staring at the desk. "Got some history with a bad father apparently, so I'm a bit concerned about that. But like you said, she's pretty independent."

_Alina had a bad father? I don't recall any of that in their previous night's conversation._ He quickly tilted his head to Hank for more answers, but Hank's glazed look indicated that the man's mind seemed to be elsewhere still. _I'm guessing it happened while I was in stasis._

"I'm glad to hear that you've made some progress on finding out more about her. Tina updated me a bit earlier saying that you three were doing well, but it's nice to hear it directly from you." The soft and gentle look the Captain had suddenly turned serious as he cupped his hands together.

"The reason I bought you two here today was to initially help question an android witness. The human homicide incident happened around 3am tonight. The human woman died due to carbon monoxide poisoning, just like in the report I sent you earlier Connor. We had hoped that by the time you guys arrived at the station, we would have coaxed the android out of the house by now to question." The Captain rubbed his face and eyes before continuing. "But unfortunately we were unsuccessful so we decided that maybe Connor can help ease her out of the crime scene as a fellow android."

Connor simply nodded back in response.

"Of course, Captain."

"Alright, alright, hold up." Hank held up his hands. "Let me settle in a bit. So we got a human killed by carbon monoxide and an android witness. Any other third parties involved? And how do we know that the android witness didn't set up any of this? I need details, Jeffrey."

"Forensics team already investigated the majority of the house and found the garage door and gas furnace flue pipe tampered with, indicating an intruder that deliberately set up the situation. As for the android and human, according to their social media the two are on good terms based on their relationship status. And the android is currently still in shock at the crime scene." The Captain then looked directly to Connor. "I've tried to preserve the carbon monoxide levels as it originally was so that you can piece together things for the investigation. Androids are not as affected by carbon monoxide, am I correct?"

"You are correct, Captain. Androids mostly used artificial respiration to help us initially integrate with humans. Thank you for preserving the crime scene with the carbon monoxide, I will make sure to put it to good use."

Connor sees that out of the corner of his eye Hank smirking to his comment.

"You and your fancy gimmicks."

"You can look more into the details that I've sent to your computer console." The Captain then waved them away. "You are dismissed."

They return to their desk, to which Hank complains about the coming headache he'll get from this new case.

As they get settled down, Connor hears bits and pieces of music leaking from Alina's earbuds. She was humming along to the tune and occasionally went a pitch higher or lower than the original song singers whenever she mumbled out slightly incorrect lyrics. Her singing wasn't too bad, if anything she was skipping over a lot of lyrics in addition to her slight mispronunciations.

"_You know I'm not scared, Of the dark_...I'm not running, running, running. No, I'm not afraid of the fall...Why would a start, a start ever be afraid of the dark?...I'm not scared, even from the scar~''

Connor chuckled some more as she slurred through the various lines of the 2018 song, "Scared of the Dark" by Lil Wayne and Ty Dolla Sign. It was strange how she knew the lyrics of a song and tune of a song so well even though it was made a couple years before she was born. Perhaps her parents listened to the tune often?

He turned his attention back to the computer console and hissed a bit at how the DPD chair screeched at his action. _They really should have gotten better chairs here since sometimes they had to be in them for hours straight._ He then interfaced with the console to open up the new case details.

**[Case Number: #58901]**

**[Case Reference: Carbon Monoxide Homicide & Intrusion]**

**[Victim: Eris Smith]**

**[Reporting Officer: Chris Miller]**

**[Case Assigned to : Lt Anderson & Detective Anderson]**

**[Case Status: Open]**

**[Involving Android: Yes]**

**[Paramedics arrived at 3:08AM to the call of a PF500, Serendipity, about her human companion's face being grey-blue and not knowing what to do. The PF500 also told paramedics that her partner was experiencing dizziness, headache, fatigue, went to sleep and then was unresponsive. Upon arrival at the scene, the Paramedics' personal carbon monoxide detectors went off, prompting them to treat the victim outside of the house. They found that the victim did not have a pulse and performed CPR, but failed to revive the victim. The victim's body is currently being analyzed at the Forensics Department. PF500 currently still at the scene.]**

**[Police at the scene also found the flue pipe, garage lock, and gas furnace were damaged. Ventilation vents were also mostly sealed off in the household that allowed little air flow. Carbon Monoxide reading at time of police arrival: Living Room and Kitchen(4567 ppm), Bedroom (4550 ppm), Garage (6678 ppm).]**

There was other information available too as well, such as the social media accounts of the android and human involved and other background information that he was able to quickly scan over. When he took a glance over to Hank, he found the older man still only a fourth of the way through the report details. Connor estimated that it would take about 10-15 minutes more before Hank would be done reading and they could move out to the scene.

He decided to quickly review the materials of the past android cases that were minor but still open. Some of them were about theft or robbery. Other cases that were still being resolved were about targeted assaults from humans. With androids' abilities to record in real time, finding assailants were much easier. The big problem was that with the shortage of android prosecutors compared to the past, it was hard to technically count cases as 'closed' and have victims fully press charges in court. With the integration of androids, the number of cases seem to rise everyday, even if they weren't alway big like homicides.

In a matter of seconds, Connor was able to transfer into his system all the android cases they had at hand and now he had nothing else to do. It was good that as an android he was able to have high processing speeds. But it also meant that time seemed to stretch between breaks. He liked being productive so that it fulfilled a sense of satisfaction.

He began to tap rhythmically on his table as he decided on his next move while his internal clock ticked at each passing second. He swept a quick glance around the DPD as he impatiently waited for Hank to finish up. That's when he noticed that Alina was still humming to the song he heard prior, 'Scared of the Dark'.

_That's right, didn't Alina want to make some food for Hank? I could compile the grocery list right now._

Using his internal communications, he sent a text over to the tablet. He made sure to label the sender identification as him to not startle the young girl.

_**Connor: Hello!**_

The tablet buzzes and he sees Alina tapping her earbuds to pause the music before going to the messaging application icon. Upon reading the message, she looked up from her tablet and gave Connor a puzzled look.

_**Alina: Why are we texting when you are right next to me? (?-?)**_

_**Connor: You said you wanted to surprise Hank with dinner. So I figured we could compile a grocery list right now.**_

_**Alina: Ahhh, that makes sense. I'm planning to make fried rice. I figured it was a nice first time homemade Asian dish especially since there are a lot of Western Chinese Restaurants that serve it. What does Hank eat normally?**_

_**Connor: Hmmm. He used to stop by the Chicken Feed truck for lunch everyday for a hamburger. Though I managed to reduce it to two times a week.**_

_**Connor: Now he gets ham sandwiches and beef filled burritos in between hamburger days.**_

_**Alina: I guess I can make it beef fried rice, was considering the classic chicken at first.**_

_**Connor: I'm sure he'll enjoy it.**_

_**Alina: As for vegetables: garlic, cabbage, frozen corn, broccoli, and carrots**_

_**Connor: Hank doesn't like vegetables.**_

_**Alina: I'm well aware.**_**_（っ＾▿＾）_**

_**Connor: How so?**_

_**Alina: Because you mostly mentioned meat products.**_

_**Alina: Also, I can't imagine anyone continuously eating hamburgers everyday without that reason.**_

_**Alina: I'll make sure to put lots of beef and chop the vegetables to be super tiny and add in egg too! :D**_

_**Alina: Hmmm as for sauces + seasoning, soy sauce, fish sauce. All seasoning spice. And oil of course.**_

_**Alina: Do you have a big frying pan?**_

_**Connor: I believe so.**_

_**Alina: Well, that's all I can think of for now.**_

_**Alina: Ahh, but I'll need to go to an Asian supermarket if that is alright. Is there any open nearby?**_

Connor quickly searches up some Asian supermarkets and comes across "Park to Shop Supermarket and Wholesale" being the closest matching to Alina's expectations. He expects a 90% chance that its the kind that she's looking for.

_**Connor: Yes, I have one in mind that we can go to.**_

_**Alina: Nice! I didn't think Detroit would have a Chinatown**_

_**Alina: I was worried we wouldn't be able to find one**_

_**Connor: I was surprised myself.**_

Connor paused as he reflected on the conversation that just ended. It was nice talking to someone other than Hank. It was on a light topic too, such as food. Unlike talking to his coworkers, he didn't have to be professional. _Hmmm, should I try those emojis too? But how should I continue this conversation? Should I continue with the food topic?_

_**Connor: You seem to be well informed about food dishes off the top of your head. Do you know any other recipes?**_

_**Alina: Yup! Lots, I cooked for myself and mother all the time! :)**_

_Huh, she left out her father in that mention. Should he press on and ask about her father? Or was it too soon? _They only met her for a day, it's probably too sensitive of a topic to breach upon right now.

_**Connor: I look forward to your dish. Even though I can't eat, I'm sure it'll taste good. **_**_(*＾▽＾)／_**

_**Alina: :o :D I didn't know you used emojis too!**_

_**Connor: I'm experimenting after seeing you use them.**_

_**Alina: \ (•◡•) /**_

_**Connor: **_**_(๐॔˃̶ᗜ˂̶๐॓)_**

_**Connor: It's an interesting way of expression. Although I'm not actually crying with tears, it seemed appropriate of a response.**_

_**Alina:**_**_(๐॔˃̶ᗜ˂̶๐॓)_**

_**Alina: I know that, silly. I'm right next to you :p**_

He glanced up from his console and found Alina smiling with a little wave before he got another notification.

_**Alina: You're so funny Connor**_

_**Connor: I didn't instead for that to be a joke, but I'm glad you liked it. :) **_

_**Alina: lol**_

_**Alina: Oh yeah, if you want, I can cook for Hank on the other days too to set him to a healthier food plan other than hamburgers. I can say I'm quite proud of my expertise cooking when it comes to a healthier diet. **_**_ー( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ_**

_**Connor: That is very considerate of you. If that is no bother. I'm sure Hank won't mind.**_

They ended up continuously chattering about food and necessary ingredients for a while. His foreign language program also became useful when sometimes Alina couldn't think of the English word for an ingredient and typed the ingredient in Chinese instead. He wasn't sure for how long they were texting because the conversation just managed to carry him along and flowed very easily. They were midway talking about potential desserts when he heard Hank call out to him with a slightly annoyed voice but it was also laced with a bit of worry.

"Connor! Con!"

Connor quickly stepped out of his internal communication and faced Hank with a professional business smile.

"Is there something of concern, Hank?" He leaned forward and tilted his head to the side, wondering if something set off the older gruff man.

"You were blinking a lot and your LED kept spinning yellow, so I thought something was up." Hank replied back with his eyebrows furrowed together.

"I apologize if that was concerning to you." Connor used his hand to gesture to Alina. "I was texting with Alina while I was waiting for you and the conversation lasted much longer than I expected."

Hank crossed his arms and his eyes flicked between the two for a bit.

"Why didn't you guys speak out loud then?"

"It seemed unprofessional to talk about food while still in a work setting." Connor explained. "Furthermore, I've discovered the fun of expressing emotions through Emojis."

"Umm," Hank's jaw slacked a bit while his gaze was fixated on Connor. "Well, I'm glad you learned something new?" He then rubbed his hands together while getting up. "But I'm ready to go now for the crime scene." He then walked across the room over to Tina, who was now back at her desk.

"Hey Tina. Is it alright if i leave her to your care?"

The young officer grinned and eagerly nodded her head back.

"Of course, Lieutenant. And I'll have Pearson take over looking over her during my lunch break, if needed." Tina then waved her hands in the air, signaling for Alina to come over to her side. Alina promptly skidded over with the rolling DPD chair and settled in a spot next to Tina that didn't block the hallway.

Strangely, Gavin said nothing about the new adjustment. He simply grunted, kept his face down and kept his gaze to the other side of his desk that didn't have the young girl. The man also adjusted his arm, propping it up to further block a view of Alina.

_**Connor: If anything with Gavin happens, let me know.**_

Alina instantly looked up from her tablet and sent him a thumbs up sign with a gleaming smile.

_**Alina: Aye aye Captain**_

_**Connor: ?**_

_**Alina: :p**_

He simply shook his head in confusion after seeing her catchphrase and left the precinct with Hank.

* * *

When they arrived at the scene to a one story suburban-like house, Chris was there to greet them.

"Hello, Lieutenant." Chris tipped his cap and then turned to Connor with a wide smile. "And you too Connor!"

As they walked to the house doorway, Chris gave them a run down of the situation.

"Forensics mapped out some places for you two already. As the Captain told you, we tried to maintain the original Carbon Monoxide levels for Connor to analyze by leaving the door and windows shut." Chris explained. "Hank, if you want to go in, you'll have to put on this suit with a mini-oxygen tank." He pulled out the familiar yellow forensics outfit from a large black bag and placed it into Hank's care.

Chris then pointed to the house, "The Android witness is still in the bedroom. But you are free to take a look at the rest of the house while you are here." The younger officer then left to guard the holographic police line tape as there were a couple onlookers from across the street.

Upon inspecting the suit, Hank's forehead creased and his nose crinkled at the flimsy material before him.

"Hank, I'm going to have a look around first if that's alright."

"Go for it," Hank absentmindedly responded, he then lifted the suit up and glared at it. "I'll try to figure out how to put on this weird ass suit."

Connor rubbed his hands together as he felt his thirium pump beat faster at the prospect of being productive again. The first place he went to was the garage as based on the DPD report, the intruder supposedly came in through there. When he arrived at the location, he found that the wooden garage door was the sectional kind that could slide up and over. Located at the bottom middle of the garage door was a simple twist and turn handle that used a keyhole lock.

Connor bent down to the keyhole's level and laid down to get a closer lock when he noted that there were several scratches around it, most likely a human as androids are much more advanced and would be able to avoid scratching any exterior material in tampering with the lock. Furthermore, he could see millimeter small scraps of metal around the edges of the inside key mechanisms. The intruder most likely got in with the conventional picking of the lock method, if he could analyze the metal later it would be possible that they could track the manufacturing owner and go down a list of third party buyers.

What was also peculiar was that the door handle didn't have any fingerprints within the last 24 hours. He gently rested his hand on his chin while admiring the work. _Not bad, limiting their traces a bit. _

Connor heaves himself back up and scans around to see if there are any potential security cameras. He doesn't see any cameras, but what he does notice is that the house is fairly run down. Just like the wooden garage door, paint is chipping off the edges and some rooftop shingles seem to be nearly falling off too. _Wait, something wasn't right._

He squinted and activated his more advanced eyesight abilities, zooming in on a couple of rooftop shingles that were slanted in awkward angles compared to others. There were peculiar spots on the rooftop that seemed as if too much pressure were put onto them and caused them to barely hinge on. Did the intruder also attempt to come in through the chimney? He'll need to ask for permission to later go have a look at the rooftop.

He would like to enter through the garage directly through here, but that would risk the carbon monoxide leaking out. He ends up walking back to the front door and to Connor's delight, Hank finished putting on the suit and oxygen tank. They quickly filed through the door and shut the door behind them.

He takes a quick look at Hank and a smirk escapes his lips when he sees Hank in the amusing getup. Hank was fully covered in the yellow rubbery suit, you could only see his face behind the square plastic cover. He honestly looked like a flubbery cartoon by only being in yellow, it reminded him of that old cartoon Hank talked about, 'Spongebob Squarepants'. Like starfish Patrick, only yellow.

Hank noticed Connor's reaction and huffed back, "What are you laughing about?"

"Nothing." Connor cheerfully murmured back and he turned back to the crime scene. The layout of the house seemed to be very similar to Hank's house, with the kitchen and living room connected and to the far left he can see the bathroom illuminating its blue tiled wall.

In the living room, there were a couple of main furniture pieces such as the green couch, a round coffee table, and a small flat screen TV. Littered around the walls were school pride items from Oakland Community College such as the green banners, a T-shirt, and a little teddy bear sitting on the cabinet with a tiny Oakland flag in hand.

On one of the side walls hung a framed picture of Eris and Serendipity with one of their community college buildings in the background. As per his usual protocol, his facial recognition system kicked in and automatically linked to the DPD database system.

**[Eris Smith-Born 1/27/2015, Lives at 10531 Wayburn St]**

**[Serendipity Smith-Activated 2/03/2037, Lives at 10531 Wayburn St]**

According to the files, Eris was a 2nd year student getting her Associate in Business Administration and did poorly in her first year. Serendipity was bought by Eris's family to tutor her and apparently the two fell in love around March after a month of being together. On Eris' social media page, she tagged herself as 'in a relationship' and photos flooded her page on their couple life. As far as the DPD knows, the two were still on good terms. Connor silently wondered if Eris' family and friends approved of it.

Connor took another swept around the living room. It was only when he saw Hank's suit a second time, nearly burst out in laughter and had to choke them back, did he remember that he should have taken a Carbon Monoxide reading earlier for this room.

**[Initializing Carbon Monoxide Detector …]**

**[Living Room: 4550ppm]**

"4550ppm of carbon monoxide, slightly lower than the report. Then again a couple of hours have passed." He announced out loud to Hank and then quickly stepped into the kitchen for another reading. "4548ppm for the kitchen. With this high of readings, a human could suffocate and die in about 15-20 minutes of exposure."

"4000 parts per million? I know that at 100 that shit deadly already. How the hell did so much get in here?" Hank grumbled before going to the kitchen as well and examined the spotless dinner table.

Connor checked out the rest of the kitchen, finding that all the dishes were properly washed and in their drying rack. No kitchen equipment such as bowls or pans were left out either, suggesting that the couple were settling in for the night when the incident occured. He then approached the oven and cooking stove top just as a precaution even if the report said it was a garage flue pipe link. The gas line was properly screwed on and his detectors didn't sense any increase in carbon monoxide levels from the area, so he cleared that possibility out.

"Sheesh, is it me or is it pretty hot in here?"

Connor turned back to Hank and found the older man attempting to air himself by flapping the yellow suit around his chest.

**[Internal Temperature Reading: 60 Degrees Fahrenheit]**

**[External Body Temperature Reading: 85 Degrees Fahrenheit]**

"They had the heat turned up to 85, Hank. That's probably what you are feeling."

"What the fuck, that's fucking hot." He exasperates back. "How the hell did forensics work in this condition?!"

Connor didn't say anything back to Hank's comment and simply made his way to the bathroom when out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that the thermostat reading was at 70 degrees Fahrenheit. _That's strange, usually thermostats would only be a few degrees off. _He quickly rushed over to the spot and opened up the panel, finding that some of the wires had been tampered with and logged it into the DPD report database.

"Hank!" He called out. "The thermostat has been tampered with, I added it to the database just now. Do you want to take a look?" Connor watched as Hank begrudgingly trudge over in the yellow suit.

"You sure this ain't an android doing? Maybe the intruder was an android or had an accomplice."

"Not sure about the android accomplice part, but I know that whoever unlocked the garage door was most likely human judging by the handiwork. They also seem to have some knowledge on engineering as they chose to tamper the wires that specifically dealt with the display panel."

"Alright alright, spare me the jargon." Hank said while waving his arms. "Just check out the other rooms and let me out. I'm dying in this damn suit."

**[Bathroom: 4548ppm]**

Slightly lower reading than the kitchen and living room, but that was probably because of the side ventilation vent installed in the bathroom. Though, it was unusual for the ppm to still be this high if the ventilation system was working properly in normal circumstances, he'll have to investigate that too.

He then stepped into the garage with Hank right behind him. As soon as he stepped in, his carbon monoxide detector spiked up to 6634ppm. THIS was definitely deadly, a human could die within 5 minutes if they were exposed to this much.

Much like the report, the flue pipe that exhausted the carbon monoxide from the gas furnace was severely damaged, like someone smashed it from all directions. The pipe was hit in 5 random spots.

**[Analyzing… ]**

**[6-INCH Diameter Steel Flue Pipe]**

_Huh, there are streaks near the bent parts though that were of a metal composite._

**[2 mm Streak-Carbon Steel Composite]**

So the intruder most likely knew what kind of material the flue pipe was to be able to make a dent in it. This was most likely a pre-planned attack based on everything, but for how long were they planning this and why? Why this specific method if they wanted to kill someone?

Connor then stepped over to the gas furnace, finding that some of the screws were roughly put back on, as if they were put back in a hurry. He then opened up the panel of the gas furnace to see the interior and found that the heat exchanger was cracked. Normally this occurs accidentally through stress cracks, causing clean air to mix with polluted carbon monoxide air, but these were intentional and had the same streaks with carbon-steel composition.

He also noted that the flame supervision device was tinkered as well. The device normally shuts off the gas valve to prevent carbon monoxide leaks. But whoever tinkered with the mechanics made small minor adjustments to the mechanics to cause some carbon monoxide to leak.

The 3 main components to this device were the thermocouple, electric magnetic coil within the valve, and the gas valve itself. The pilot light flame, which turned on the flame supervision device, was devilishly flickering. It confirmed that the supposed exhaust carbon monoxide air was mixing into the combustion air space and contamining the clean air that went into the heater system. The fact that the pilot light flame was still burning meant that the heat system believes it didn't hit the right temperature number, which explains the thermostat and real temperature discrepancy.

Since the pilot light flame kept going, it kept opening the thermocouple and magnetic coil, which left the gas valve open and continuously exposing the house occupants to carbon monoxide. The magnetic coil in place was also a bit bent, and using his reconstruction he could see that even if the gas furnace were to reach the desired thermostat number, the gas valve would remain partially open from the tampered magnetic coil.

He felt a chill go down his spine at all the handiwork, whoever did this meticulously planned every element so that carbon monoxide would build up in the household and set aside precautions. Perhaps even the ventilation system was compromised and that's why the rooftop shingles were left in awkward positions. But getting up to the rooftop evidence would have to be a problem for another time to properly preserve the crime scene, the DPD don't normally hold equipment for scaling up houses.

He should probably check up on Serendipity at this point and measure the ppm in their bedroom as well. When he comes back to the main house, Hank is still checking out the garage.

After identifying the bedroom, Connor gently knocks before entering and finds the woman android sitting on the ground next to a grey queen size bed. The blue haired girl had her knees up to her chest, hands tightly wound around herself. Her head was buried into her knees with her curly hair covering any possible facial expression.

He slowly approached the girl until he was about 1 feet away and knelt down to one knee.

"Hello, my name is Connor. I'm with the Detroit Police Department." He used a soft and light tone while introducing himself to not startle the girl. She simply looked up, revealing a human-like face that resembled someone in their twenties. She then quickly backed up upon seeing him, only to bang into the brown dressing drawer behind her.

Connor decided to back up a bit to give her some room before speaking again, "What's your name?"

This should be a good start to interact, should he have started with her name she might have been frightened even further.

"Serendipity." The girl responded back, almost like a whisper.

"Serendipity," He repeated back softly, trying to think of how to continue the conversation. "It's a beautiful name."

"It was," She replied back before tears started pouring down her face. "She said that I was the best thing that happened to her, so that's why she named me that."

Connor quickly became alarmed, not sure how to console her as the girl's cries and sniffles became louder. Her entire body was shaking, and while she attempted to wipe away the tears, her arms were shuddering that they just smeared her tears around her face.

"I-I loved her so much," She choked out in between her onslaught of sobs. "I-I didn't know what to do when she didn't respond."

All Connor could do was listen, he wasn't sure of the right way to approach this. _Hank would be better at this._ He simply sat there, panicking as her stress levels hung dangerously around 95% when he first spoke to her. However, as time passed and the crying continued, strangely her stress levels slowly decreased so he simply said nothing as he watched for any changes in developing.

"I am … sorry for your loss." He finally muttered out after about 3 minutes of silence.

She merely nodded back while her bottom lip quivered and her shoulders drooped down some more.

"I'm not sure how to comfort you," He disclosed softly with a pause. "But what I can tell you is that I'll do everything in my power to find the perpetrator."

His thirium pump beat rapidly and rammed in his chest as he awaited her reaction, hoping that it was the right thing to say.

She gave him a tight-lipped smile back and nodded solemnly at his comment, "Thank you."

She then trained her eyes on the wooden floor as the hiccups started to subside and her flushed face steadily returned to normal.

"Are you feeling much better now?" Connor asked, going a little closer now that she seemed to have trusted him.

She nodded a 'yes' back to him, "Y-Yes, I'm sorry you had to see me like that. I-I'm just…" She briefly let her head hang down as she fumbled out the next set of words. "I still can't believe Eris is gone."

"Can you tell me what happened?" He inquired.

"I can show you," Serendipity retracted her skin showing the white behind. "Though everything feels a bit fuzzy right now."

Connor quickly retracted his skin and interfaced, immediately lurching backing and nearly losing his balance as he was faced was a wave of emotions. Sadness, grief, pain … SO much PAIN, as if the emotions were originally embedded in his own coding. He swallowed deeply and sucked in a deep breath as the memories transferred over and all the feelings Serendipity had in the experiences washed over him.

Ṯ̷̤̹̲̲̎́́͋̐h̵̢̧͚͈̫͇͇̭̮̊́͑͝ě̸̞̩̼̙̦̌͋̆̚ͅ ̵̣͇̩̖̺̗̘̖̀̍̌̋̀͗̓͝ͅn̵̝̲̖̘͍̭̤͕̠̍̆̋̉̂̓̆̓̐ȧ̷̼͚̟̫̥̾͆̾̈̿́̋̌ͅm̵̧͙̖̅͑ȩ̵͉̳̠̙̣̞͉̍́͗ ̸̩̹͉͉̝͕̰͛̓͒̄i̴̥͛͌́ş̵͇̖͍͈͑̊̿͘ͅͅ ̵̢̖̿̏̋̇̑̈́̚E̷͔̣͈̚ͅr̶̗͈̙̬̲̣̭̮̟̾̽͒̇̍̕͝ͅí̵̛̟s̶̨̺͚̣̪͚͌̽͒̀̀͘͘͜͝.̸̨̳̦͉̜̪̜̖̹̄̂̎̈́̚ ̵̠̻̠̲̠̟̾͘ͅͅJ̸̢͉̯̳̘̤͍̯͕̱͂u̴̜̻̗̗̙͙͋s̸̢̪͇̬͕̓̇͐̐̒͑̌̚ͅt̸̲͕̓̀͊̂̂̅͠͠ ̸̛̗͍͛̒̈́d̴̹̜̩̲̺̻̤̍͋̑̃͜͠o̸̝̬͕͉͉͂͋́̊ṋ̴̡͇̘͌́̓͌̾̿͘͝'̶̞̩͋̉͑͝t̶̗̲̎̔̆͋̀͛̊̔ ̵͓̩̠̣̄͒̄́̕̚f̶͔̠̰̯̦̖̦͛ű̴͚͕̱̫͈̠̘̹̮͐ç̴͍̣͎̋̎̔͋̓̽̓͘̚͠k̸̻̰̹͉̒̎̾̓ì̶͈̒͌̋́̃͛̏͆͝ñ̴͚̬̕g̸̙̟̜̽ ̴̡̙͑̒͊́͛̑͠͝͝m̶̢͚͓̭̪̬̗̭̞̤̔͐̅̈̿͝é̸̱͉̔̆̿̐̕̚͜͠ͅs̷̨͉̦̞̻̳̣̦̺̍́͊̆̈́͗s̷̛̞͇͔̦̖̲̎̅̓̅̇͠ ̵̧̨̻̦̮͈͋w̵͇̲̩͊̈́i̷͍͔̩̣̭̰̟͙̚t̸͖̮̍́̏͠ḩ̶̟̙͎͍̉̇̏͘͝ ̸̥̲̗̖̈́̈̏̎̚m̴̨̳͙̱̟̼͓̪̥̻͒͝ȇ̷̢̨̥̖͚̮̞̲̮̑͑̉.̶͇̳̻͇̼͖̋̔̐̅̏̌̓̉

_Their first meet. N-No, Eris and Serendipity's first time meeting. _

Į̷͔͖̲̙̝̳́͆͛̈́̽̄̽̈́̂ ̴̨̨̳͔̦̣̹̰̝̋̒͐̃͗̓͠ļ̴̫͉͓̟̺̹͚̮̒͆͋́̈́̓̇͛̔ȏ̷̝̩̀ͅͅv̶̩̟̫̪̚ê̸̥͋̓͗̏͑̇͘͠ ̴̞͓̙͎̳̱̮̙̗́̌͊̒͛̾̾͘͘ͅẙ̶̹̩̆́͑̇̿͐̆̕̚͜o̴̖͔͇̠̳̤͇̼͑͒̐͑͒̇̚ų̸͇̾͛̓̏̑̐̓͗̇͆.̸̨̡͇̱̹̤͈̄̐́̍͊͛͛͑̚͜͝

Flashes of their love confession.

E̶̡̹̲͇͎͎͙͚̳̎͠ȑ̸͔̭̀̅̈́͜ͅi̶͕͎͛͛̃̎̌̌̎̚s̶̨͋̍!̶̹̒͂̂͛̀̃́ͅ ̵̙͊͂͆̅W̶̨̙̝̩̗̺̬̭̑̾̓͛̚h̵̨̯̩̀a̷̩̲̽͒̆͋̉ṫ̷̟̣̮̪͕̘̙̰̓̿̈́͌́͌͝ͅ'̸̛͓̈́́̈̽̈́̀͛́s̸̡̧̯̗̟͇̺͂̿͛͑ ̷̨̡̛̤̮͘w̸͕̓͌͗͒͑͂͐r̸̛̗̭̮͙̝̭͕̗̅͑̊̎̉o̴̡̧̞͉̤̽͒̑̚ņ̵͙͗̎̉̾̎̊̀̕͜͠͠g̶̳̒͜?̸̡̲̹̩̮͝!̶̡͓̳͚͍̳̫̺͝ͅͅ ̴̨̳̲̗̯͔͚̋͒̕Ẻ̵̝̮͉͔̒͊̉͘R̷̡̘̣͎͚͖͋̀͂̏̈́̀̂͝Ḭ̵̺͍̇̒̋͜Ş̴̣͉͚̯̤̞̰̟͐̂́̿̅̕̚̚͠͝

And then it's finally the memory from yesterday night. It was a normal day, they had stayed at a friend's house party until about 2am. They had taken a taxi home and Eris was really tired from the party, but still starving apparently so Serendipity made some dinner for her. While making late night food, Eris complained of feeling dizzy and getting a headache. Serendipity thought it was because they had a long day out outing with their friends. She simply advised Eris to eat some of dinner and then get some rest. But by the time Serendipity finished cooking, Eris ate one bite of dinner and said that her head hurt too much so she was just going to call it a night.

At 2:48am, Serendipity had finished washing the dishes and watching Netflix and decided to go into stasis as well. But when she went into bed she found that Eris' face was grey-blue like and tried to wake her up but Eris was unresponsive so Serendipity called paramedics. Only to find out that Eris had died in her sleep and paramedics failed to revive her girlfriend.

Once he finished the interface and skin returned to normal, Connor staggered back and felt Hank's familiar grip catch him from behind.

"Woah there, son. You alright?" Hank gave him a concerned look and didn't let go till Connor reassured him.

"Y-Yes, interfacing is just overwhelming sometimes," He said, taking in several breaths as he processed everything that just happened. He let his mind settle down some, his LED taking a couple of seconds to go from red back to blue. He still had a question in mind that he wanted to ask.

"Did you not notice that the temperature was unnaturally high? Most deviants have temperature sensors I believe."

"No," She stammered back, wide eyed. "Eris usually puts the temperature up really high so I turn off my temperature sensors and readings so that I don't complain to her about the heat. My sensors only go off if the temperature goes dangerously low or too high. At most Eris usually has it around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, and it's a bit uncomfortable but not alarming."

"I see," He thought about what they could do next. "Would it be alright if you come to the station with us? That way we can ask more about Eris' relationship history and perhaps find a perpetrator."

Serendipity nervously shuffled her feet and hands, "How well does the DPD deal with android witnesses?"

Connor understood that feeling all too well when he was integrated back into the force. The fear clouding your mind and sending your biocomponents into overdrive wondering if humans would accept you. He was lucky though, for the most part a majority of his co-workers welcomed and appreciated his arrival.

"There is no need to worry. I'll be overseeing the questioning process if that helps to alleviate your fears. Furthermore, Markus also has gained the cooperation of the DPD and actively works to help out in some cases." He said, trying to dispel any fears.

Serendipity then finally got up from the ground, accidentally knocking over something on the corner of the dresser top. She bent over to the ground to pick up a tiny black box, and curiously looked at it.

"That's strange, I don't recall something like this before." She opened it up, gasping with her hand clasped over a mouth as tears started coming down her face once more. She took something out of the box, revealing a small but gleaming ring. There was a gentle, serene green jewel on it.

_Serene green, also known as the color 'Serendipity'_.

"It looks like an engagement ring." Hank said out loud in awe as they all stared at the glimmering gem.

Serendipity whimpered out as gut-wrenching sobs escaped from her once more while she examined the ring. Her legs gave out from under her and she trembled before whispering, "_I love you too."_ She held the ring firmly to her chest as if trying to hug it and press the memory of Eris to herself.

"We'll be outside whenever you're ready." He told the girl and the two Andersons left the scene quietly after he took a quick carbon monoxide measurement.

Once they were out of the house they informed Chris of the new status of the situation, Hank took off the suit and they patiently waited in the car for Serendipity.

While in the car seat, he heard Hank let out a big sigh.

"I know that I asked you this already, but are you sure you're alright son?"

Connor tilted his head in confusion to Hank's question, "Why do you ask that? And yes I am doing fine."

"Because your arm is shaking." Following Hank's eyeline, he found that his left arm was indeed shaking without his notice and he quickly stopped it with his right hand. Only it continued and that only increased his stress levels from 15% to 33%.

"I, I don't know why it's shaking Hank." He said back, the panic raising in his voice.

**[Stress Levels . . . 55%]**

Hank flashed a concerned look to Connor and took off his coat, gingerly wrapping it around Connor's figure.

Much to Connor's bewilderment, his stress levels decreased at the gesture and he pulled the coat tightly around him. He felt much warmer, safer, and secure under Hank's coat even if it did smell a little like booze. It felt . . . comforting.

"Sometimes cases can be emotionally taxing and you said it before, that when you interface you feel everything that of other androids." Hank wrapped an arm around Connor's right arm and pulled Connor to him. "I can't imagine having to feel the full brunt of emotions in mere seconds. Especially from someone who just lost a loved one. Just take it easy, alright?"

The older man patted Connor on the back some more and Connor watched as his stress levels went down to 10%.

"Hank?

"Hm?"

"Thank you."

"Ahhh, Connor. Don't you go to puppy eyes mode."

* * *

So! That concludes this chapter! I hope you liked the the detective aspect, as I am looking at my pages count rn, damnnn I'm at page 15, and word count says 7k (0-0) Also has a weird format compared to ao3 with emojis, so somethigs turned out a bit weird and i had to compromise with emoticons, not sure how they look here

Welp, I apologize if any grammar happened or the quality went down a bit. Swamped with college online classes but i hopeed to still get a chapter up

Also detroit evolution came out! Please check tht out on utube, its a 75 minute Reed900 fan made film that im going to try to watch this weekend

Stay safe u guys and here is this week's q & a!

Hmmm, I guess the question is have you tried out the 3 ingredient dolgano coffee that has been spicying the internet around? I have yet to try it, but i'm working on learning new dishes to make while im stuck at home. How are you guys with cooking? XD i'm still an amateur home cook. And what is your favorite homemade dish? whether its by you or a family member


	8. Fried Rice

Ello, its been 3 weeks again XD idk why i keep doing this. Anyway, you guys, i might not here from me for about 2-3 weeks since college online classes finals are hitting from the skies unfortunately. I am dying in the world of studying. Hopefully it hasnt impacted my writing too much

Also, I realized how smol Alina is next to Connor and Hank. I thought it would be cute to make her smol. But a feet difference is much larger than i thought apparently XD her being like 5'1" and connor & hank 6 ft

Other than that, its showtime!

And also ofc q & a session the very end

* * *

Last chapter . . .

Connor and Hank are assigned to a new case, one that involves a carbon monoxide homicide with an android witness. They come back home after a tired day of interviewing Serendipity, the android witness.

* * *

It's around 7:30pm when the three of them get back to Hank's house. Alina greatly enjoyed the grocery store run as it gave her a sense of familiarity being in an Asian supermarket. There was a sense of comfort to be among the hustle and bustle of Asian Aunties with their booming voices echoing in the supermarket. At first, Hank and Connor had mistaken the Asian Auntie customers as being really grumpy and mad, but she explained to them that this is just how a lot of them talked. Particularly in some provinces of China, she explained that some dialect speeches simply emphasized their words a lot while speaking.

She was lucky that her mother was soft-spoken and didn't carry that same level of tone with her. When Alina was younger, it took a while to get used to the louder voiced Asian Aunties in the streets of Chinatown. She could say it was a bit emotionally scarring to deal with their blaring voices every time she went to the supermarket, but her mother wasn't as startled. So she simply followed her mother's lead and got used to the thunderous rumble of Asian talk.

When Alina got to Hank's kitchen, she quickly shook away these thoughts, focused on preparing a meal quickly enough so that Hank wouldn't feel too hungry. That's when she realized that she wasn't familiar with his kitchen and that the mechanisms might be different in 2038.

"Sorry, dinner might take a bit longer to make." She said sheepishly, scratching her hair as she looked back to Hank still taking off his coat. "I'm not as familiar with how your kitchen works."

He gave back a tired, but soft expression as he landed on the couch.

"It's alright kid, sometimes I don't even eat dinner and go straight to bed."

She saw Connor throw a concerned look at Hank, but he didn't say anything and simply moved to where she was in the kitchen.

"I'll show you around the kitchen. Is there any specific cookware or ingredients you're looking for?" Connor said as he opened the cabinets one by one and instructed her on where everything is.

"Hmmm, I would like to work with a wok pan," She replied back, gently tapping her fingers on her chin. "But I don't think you'll have that. A regular stir fry pan should work fine though."

He nodded back and made a beeline for the 4th cabinet from the left, taking out a medium sized stir frying pan. She gratefully took the pan from him, a small smile perking from her lips as she marveled at the pan. It was a nonstick type, which she knew was going to make her life a whole lot easier. She gave it a good twirl as she noticed that it was in relatively good condition despite the fact that it seemed a bit worn out. She had half expected Hank's kitchen cookware to be old and grimy since he didn't seem to type to cook, but it looked like Connor probably took care of it in Hank's steed.

She listed out all the other cookware she needed and with each mentioned Connor speedily brought it out a second later. _Well, he is CyberLife's most advanced android._ After managing to find everything she needed, Connor proceeded to give her a mini tour of all kitchen instrument placements. Her head ended up spinning from the tour of the kitchen and she could have _sworn_ in the middle of it all she saw Hank smirking at her predicament.

Minutes of the tour of kitchen placement felt longer than it should have and by the end of it she felt like she learned almost nothing from the sheer volume overload.

Connor must have noticed her confusion because he paused for a brief moment before turning his attention back to her.

"Should I go over it again?" He said with an innocent look on his face.

"No!" She said a little too quickly back. Her voice pitch being a bit louder and higher than she expected.

"I-I'm good," She stammered back, quickly composing herself to make a seamless transition from her abrupt cry. "I think I'll just ask you if I can't find anything. Thank you though!"

After that, Connor left for the living room while Alina rolled up her sleeves to get to work. She pulled out a medium sized pot and filled it with 2 cups of rice. She then filled up the pot with some cold water to rinse it and then drained it before filling it up a second time with cold water. After washing her hands, she placed her index finger in the pot of rice and water to measure the water level. _Hmmm, just a little bit over my first knuckle. Probably should get rid of the excess water so it won't be too moist._ She diligently poured out a little bit of water before testing the water level a second time. _Perfect!_ _I haven't lost my touch after all! _She beamed as she turned on the gas knob just as Connor demonstrated a while ago.

Normally, she had a rice cooker to just put in the rice, so it's been a while since she used a pot to cook rice. She made sure to promptly place a lid on the pot. _It would be nice if I had a timer to monitor the rice._ She turned back to the left side of the kitchen when she yelped in surprise bumping into something big and sturdy.

As she stepped back from the recoil, she looked up in surprise to see Connor was in the kitchen again. His hands were on her shoulders, steadying her as her brows furrowed in confusion to see him back.

"I-I, um, came to see if you needed help." He said as his eyes flicked to the ground for a moment and he shuffled his feet.

"Um, I think I'm good for the most part," She said, giving an honest reply. But the instance she said those words his shoulders drooped and she found herself following up with, "But it'll be nice to have an extra helping hand."

Connor instantly perked up and she directed him to where she had the cutting board laid out earlier from Connor's mini tour extravaganza.

"I was going to get started with cutting the vegetables, but maybe you can do that while I stir fry some eggs." From the grocery bags, she pulled out a stalk of broccoli flower, garlic, carrots and a bag of frozen kernel corn.

Connor tilted his head upon seeing Alina open up the frozen kernel bag.

"We need to cut the kernel corn too?"

Alina gave a lop-sided grin back, "No, I'm just taking a cup of kernel corn out to defrost in warm water. You don't need to worry about that." She took out a tiny bowl from one of the top cabinets and promptly did as she said, while she heard the chopping sounds from Connor in the background.

She then directed her attention to the eggs in the fridge, cracking them into another plastic bowl neatly with no shells leaking out to the egg yolk. _Another successful egg crack_, she smiled fondly as her mind suddenly pulled her back to a faint memory to when she was 10.

Back then, when she was first learning how to make fried rice, her mother was chopping vegetables right alongside her, just like where Connor was right now. Alina remembered how her younger self was desperate to be as amazing of a cook as her mother and wanted to learn everything there was to cooking.

"_Mom! Let me try! I wanna help! I wanna chop the vegetables!" 10 year old Alina eagerly said, cheerfully jumping up and down so that her view of sigh just __**barely **__reached above the countertop. Even back then, she was very short and needed a stepping stool to see her mother's work._

_Her mother gently pulled back the younger girl's bangs and giggled at Alina._

"_You're too young, you'll hurt yourself. Mama doesn't want to see you get hurt." _

_Alina crossed her arms in frustration, pouting and giving pleading eyes as her mother continued chopping. Finally, her mother relented, giving a sigh and placed the girl on a stepping stool. Her mother handed her a bowl of egg yolks and directed the young girl to mix them with a pair of chopsticks. _

_Alina squinted at the egg yolk mixture while focusing all her motor skills on mixing it perfectly for her mother, she marveled at how the color changed from light to darker shades of yellow. It was like a moving painting as the egg yolk swirled together slowly and her mother hummed softly in the background while chopping the vegetables._

_What was it again? The song na-_

"-Lina"

Alina suddenly jolted up to the voice, the egg yolk bowl nearly spilling over the side.

"Hm?" She looked to her left, only now gaining awareness that someone was next to her.

Connor's forehead had puckered together and he hovered over her with a gentle but worried expression.

"You've been stirring those eggs together for a while and spacing out, so I was wondering if you were alright."

"Oh," She looked down to the eggs and they were indeed already mixed together. "Sorry. I was just thinking of a memory, when I was first learning how to cook this with my mum."

Alina placed the stir fry pan on the stovetop, turned on the fire and patiently waited for the pan to heat up to a proper temperature. She took a quick look at the rice to check to make sure it wasn't boiling over, before rushing to the fridge to get out the soy sauce, cooking wine and light fish sauce. She almost bumped into Connor a second time when putting down the items and took a glance at Connor's work.

Surprised.

That was one way to describe how Alina felt when she saw the result of his chopping skills. It wasn't necessarily bad. . .

Just unique?

For the broccoli, he had left the stalk stem on and the big broccoli flower _was_ technically cut into smaller versions of them. But each one was like the size of an index finger. The carrot skin was skinned off and the inner part of the carrots were chopped as well. Similar to the style of the broccoli cuts, the carrots were chopped into big clumps. She would say that the dimensions were about 1 inch in height, width, and length. They were mostly cut into squares except for some rounded parts, but WAY too big for fried rice style.

Then again, it was her fault in not specifying details. She kinda assumed that Connor would know how small the vegetables would be in a fried rice recipe that he could look them up from the images of the internet.

"Um, good job on the vegetables." She said, blinking a couple of times in trying to figure out how to phrase her next set of words. "But, I think they needa be a little bit smaller for fried rice."

His LED swirled from light blue to yellow in response and he didn't appear distressed so that was good.

"I did cut them pretty small this time in comparison to my past cooking attempts. Hmmm, I guess it needs to be more miniscule than I thought."

From the living room, Alina heard a soft chuckle and a couple of chokes mixed in with Hank's laughter.

"Yeah, Connor wants to let me know that I should be eating my veggies alright."

Alina simply stared blankly back at the two and then gestured to the knife in Connor's hand.

"May I?"

Connor nodded back to her and handed over the knife, when his LED suddenly blared red and he whirled behind him to the stovetop. He let out a huff of relief after turning off the gas and hovered his hand over the pan.

"Luckily you didn't have any oil in it so it's not really burnt," Connor then took a second glance at the pot of rice boiling in water. "Your rice will also be done in about 15 minutes, I can monitor that for you if you want."

"I AM SO SORRY." Alina apologized as she felt the blood draining from her face while rushing to the pan. _I am so stupid! How could I forget about the stove?!_ She set down the kitchen knife back onto the cutting board before directing her full attention to the pan.

"Normally I'm not like this, I am _**so**_ sorry. I think I'm just not used to having someone next to me while cooking, and got distracted." She quickly poured some oil into the pan, picked up the pan and started circulating it around before dropping in the eggs to stir fry. "It's kinda nice having someone else in the kitchen with me."

This time while maintaining the right amount of heat and _**properly**_ monitoring it, she was able to make some light fluffy eggs and set it aside before attacking the vegetables again.

"You're normally alone?"

Alina jumped up a bit a second time from Connor's voice, the kitchen knife just a mere centimeter away from nearly cutting her fingers.

"Yeah," She replied back while cutting the stem of the broccoli from the rest of the stalks. "It's like a ghost town at home every night for me. Well, more like ever since I was 14 or 15?"

Alina paused and scrunched up his face while attempting to recall the most recent memory of cooking with her mother. _It's been years actually, wow didn't think of that till just now_.

"My mother worked late so I always cooked dinner alone and then subsequently ate dinner alone too. But I got used to it, I guess?" Her voice strained a bit toward the end of the sentence as she felt her throat close up a bit from another flash of memory. She silently shuttered at the recollection of how the big dark empty house seemed to swallow her when she was younger. It got weird when sometimes she'll get random bouts of loneliness that loomed over as if they were crawling over her skin.

"Thats-That's too bad." Connor said back, with some layers of remorse and concern intertwined into his voice.

She simply shrugged back, "I got used to it."

"Now when it comes to broccoli, especially with picky vegetable eaters you should have them in much smaller bits." She instructed, chopping all the broccoli stem parts into 1cm by 1cm cubicles. "The same with the broccoli flower bunch. Having them too big also takes longer time to cook, especially with broccoli stalks still intact and you could overcook certain parts making them too limpy." She continued cutting Connor's flower bunches into smaller pieces, about the length of one finger knuckle.

She then placed all the broccoli into a large bowl of warm water and added some salt into the mixture. Connor gave her a quizzical look in return.

"It's something my mother taught me to do prior. She says it gets rid of the pesticides."

She then tackled the huge blocky carrots chopped up and minced them. Right next to her was Connor trying to get the wrapper layers of the garlic off. Her mouth curved into a smile as she fondly watched Connor try his best and struggle a bit. She broke off a piece of garlic of her own, smashed it with the blunt part of the kitchen knife, which startled Connor and sent him jolting upward. She then proceeded to peel off the garlic wrapper with ease while chuckling at Connor's gapped mouth stare.

Alina smushed a couple more garlic pieces and once Connor was done peeling them she minced the garlic as well in addition to the carrots. _Egg? Check. Corn? Check. Broccoli? Check. Garlic? Yup. Rice? _

_WAIT. How long has it been since the rice was cooking?_

She normally also had a phone as her timer, but the universe didn't give her that when she got into this world. Connor seemed to have read her thoughts because as soon as she spun her back to the stovetop he was shutting off the gas valve.

"The rice should be done, 15 minutes are up." He said, taking off the lid of the pot.

She peeked inside and true to his words, the rice was nice and fluffy without being too soggy. Next she went to the fridge, pulling out a pre-cooked cut up flank steak stir fry they got at the supermarket. It was sorta a last minute decision at the market simply because she realized at the last moment that stir fry beef was better when marinated for some time. And the time needed for the beef to marinate and soak up flavors wasn't something she wanted to prep up at 7pm in the night.

It wasn't cheating right? She technically did cook everything else so in the end it's still a homemade fried rice? Oh well.

She started stir frying the beef a bit to heat up the pre-cut pieces. Once she was done, she set them aside and then went to stir fry all the vegetables. Connor was diligently watching the entire process, sticking around even when he was done helping. Once she was done cooking everything, she put all the ingredients into the stir fry pan including the rice. While keeping the pan in low heat, she began to mix everything together and cued Connor for the seasoning and her other sauces she needed to finish off the dish.

While halfway done mixing together the final pieces, Connor suddenly spoke up softly.

"Is it alright if I ask you a question?"

"Hm? Go for it. All I need to do is mix this together so it doesn't need much concentration luckily." She grinned back.

"I asked Hank about this earlier, but I wanted your opinion on it too." Connor stopped short for a moment, his eyes trained on the pan but with a glazed look. "When humans cry, it means that they're sad right?"

"It depends," She replied back, shifting her weight to her right foot as she contemplated. "Sometimes when we cry, it's because we're happy. Can you give me the context of the situation? That might help me a bit."

Connor leaned forward, resting his arms on the kitchen top as his LED whirled yellow.

"Her name was Serendipity. She was an android that just lost her human fiancé. It was the case Hank and I were working on today. She was the girl you saw walk into the precinct with us and later brought to Jericho. I wasn't really sure on how to approach her at first at the crime scene and when I asked her name, apparently it brought some unpleasant memories to the surface that made her start crying."

"What kind of memories?" Alina knitted her brows in a frown as she turned off the stove and moved all the fried rice into a large dish on the side.

Connor looked back at Alina, his gaze still sort of dazed even though they had turned their attention to each other.

"When I asked her name and I mentioned that it was a pretty name, she started telling me about how Eris, the human, named her that. She mentioned that the reason why Eris named her that was because 'she was the best thing that happened to her'. She started crying and I wasn't sure how to comfort her, yet her stress levels went down after crying." Connor shuffled his hands and feet before following up with another comment.

"It was. . . peculiar. From my knowledge, crying is an expression of sadness and is considered related to high stress levels in deviants. Yet crying somehow brought down the stress levels at the same time. I was wondering if it was the same with you? Or humans in general?"

"Well, yes. At least as far as I know. Crying makes you feel better because a lot of times it's because you feel helpless and you need to relieve that stress somehow. Sometimes, it's because people reached their breaking point. It's like a volcano in a sense? Like the lava in a volcano is all the stress you accumulate over time, and then BOOM!" Alina flailed her arms about, mimicking the gesture. "It comes pouring out after a lot of pressure. Other times, the lava leaks out in different ways like through some small crevices and comes out slowly. But in the end you're still releasing your emotions even if isn't necessarily like one big explosion."

She took a moment to pause and see Connor's reaction to her explanation. Connor's arms were crossed and fingers were slowly drumming along his long sleeves as his LED continued whirling yellow.

"Does that make sense?"

Connor slowly nodded back as he seemed to be deep in thought so Alina took that time to set up the dinner table with the utensils.

"Was-," Connor paused, before opening up again with his voice just slightly above a whisper. "Was I the final trigger then? For the explosion."

Alina suddenly paused midway while setting up the table, stunned at what Connor said.

"No." She responded quickly back, a bit of panic raising her voice. "No, no, no, no. You never were at any fault." She briskly walked back to Connor's spot by the countertop, looked at his eyes with a soft expression, despite the fact that his eyes were cast downward.

"Just because you were there when she started crying doesn't mean you're at any fault," She gently reassured him. "Sometimes we need people to be that gentle prod and guide us to talk about our feelings before it's too late and we explode on our own. And the fact that you were there for her, even just being there, that helps a lot. It really does." Her words seemed to have worked because his eyes brightened up and she could see the corners of his mouth tug into a small smile.

She thought some more about how to connect things to Serendipity as she rubbed her hands together.

"I think in this case, it was probably just Serendipity's name having a lot of meaning and powerful emotions attached to it. And you helped her release those emotions properly with someone to rely on nearby." She chewed the bottom of her lip trying to think of what else to say. "Serendipity, it is a beautiful name though. You were right on that. For me, I only know the meaning behind my Chinese name though. My mother picked it out for me." She scrunched up her face as she attempted to recall the meaning.

"It's 梁爱艳[Niu Ai Yan]. In Chinese culture, your surname is first. Hence why it starts with 'Niu' even though it's pronounced last in American culture when introducing yourself. It was passed down from my father's end even though he is only half Chinese. For 'Ai Yan', my first name in Chinese, it was something my mother decided upon. Ai means 'love' and Yan means 'beauty'. She said I was a representation of her and my father's love and their hope that their family life would be blissful. Apparently the word 'beautiful' was the first thing my father said when he met my mother and also when I was born. That was why she decided upon that name for me."

Connor stared wide-eyed at her story, "Your mother really put in a lot of thought in your name, it sounds like an amazing backstory. What about your American name of 'Alina'? Did your father choose it for you?"

"Yes," She nodded her head in response. "Though I don't really know his reasoning behind it. He never mentioned it before. But it's not a bad name either."

"I never knew that names were so important to humans before. For me, I was simply designated the name 'Connor' by CyberLife and it just stuck with me."

"Well, it's different for everyone," She said, taking a seat at the dining table after she finished setting up the table. "I think Connor is a good name for you too."

Connor pulled out a chair too, sitting at the table next to her, "Thanks."

She simply nodded back as she reclined her back to the chair to rest from the cooking.

"No, really." Connor said, speaking up again with a grateful expression. "For the talk about emotions. I'm still getting used to being a deviant and this conversation helped. Is it alright if I ask you more about emotions in the future?"

"Sure, I don't mind." She beamed back, happy that she was able to help Connor out.

"Oh yeah."

"Hm?" Alina looked to Connor's attention puzzled as he played around with the spoons.

"I think you forgot that I don't eat." He said, chuckling as he tapped the plate. "I just need to drink Thirium and I'm good."

"Oh shooot, sorry!" Alina shot up. "Where did you say the thirium packets were again?"

Connor didn't end up responding as he was laughing too much. Instead, he opted to get up and show her directly. Needless to say it was _definitely_ going to take a while to get used to being in this new world. Hopefully she won't accidentally write 2018 on dates either. Externally she groaned at that settlement as Connor continued teasing her on her kitchen mishaps.

Connor teased her even more when he woke up Hank from the older man's nap.

Welp at least she got the majority of Day 2 in a new world down. Sorta.

* * *

I am going to be honest, for our little cooking session thing in the story, I legitimately forgot about the stovetop being on and then i realized i forgot and had to like write it in xD

I also wrote half of the story while starving XD bc my parents were arguing in the kitchen so idk y i just started story wrting bc i didnt want to get breakfast at 12pm soooo hopefully my grammar is correct? I should not have written a kitchen scene while starving

Also i wanted this to be a sorta step by step process of how to make fried rice to spread amazing asian food but then it ended up sorta getting intertwined with teh story line so imma just post a link to a fun youtube video i liked in the past that has different ways to do fried rice. Was going to make an original tumblr post on it but finals got me hunkered down :( but i hope u guys will still check it out, this channel is super fun n amazing, i love them a lot:just add youtube to this following extention  watch?v=qH_o17xHls [5 mins easy Egg Fried Rice recipe) Check out their other vids tooooo. YAYYY FOR AMAZING DELICIOUS FOOOD

Welp story thoughts:

-Not as fluffy as I wanted it to be but i think for emotional development on Connor's end this was pretty nice

-it was also funny writing the cooking scene because I basically used my dad's horrible cooking skills as like my inspiration

-"梁爱艳" this chinese last name of 'niu' is actually pronounced as liang in mandarin, but 'niu' is a variation of it and also shorter too

Q&A!

Do you guys know why your parents chose the name that they had for you? Any stories behind it? Or nicknames too?


	9. Food, Food, Food

Hmmm welp ladies and gents. COLLEGE IS DONEEEE. I'M FREE FROM ZOOM UNIVERSITY, but now i just feel realllyyyy lost from like life in general bc i was driven to just do schoolwork. And now i don't have any summer employment like last year so its like reallyyyy weird. So look forward to faster updates and longer chapters and also better quality writing(hopefully) bc i can think the plot through better! :D though next month i am going to start some free online learning classes and also do some volunteering for covid families so we'll see wat happens

Andddd *drumroll* just wanted to thank everyone for answer the latest Q&A on names/nicknames and the origins behind them, it was super cool connecting with readers on that and learning more about you guys! :D

Also just wanted to take a moment to thank all the commenters in general!

Special thanks to Veira-Raven,Spoilerwayne316,Yuko Blue and Th3RedPyro for being part of the reviewer fam! (✿◠‿◠)

Also to the new follows/favorites folks that have recently joined! I didn't forget about you guys :D Brittany910,LilyKat57, Misatelle,tiblets66,topbacca,MTonks,HeartStarryNights. Hopefully I didn't miss anyone in the new/recent kudos fam

You guys really are the backbone of this fanfic ʕ•́ᴥ•̀ʔっ Just wanted to give shoutouts since was busy with zoom university in previous chapters

AND LETS GO BWAHAHAHHAHA

* * *

Hank woke up in the middle of the night again just like yesterday. This time, however, to use the restroom. And just like yesterday, he found a certain someone still up. Alina was in the kitchen mixing something on the countertop and when he stepped into the kitchen, the wafting smells of chocolate enticed him.

He silently walked up behind her and a smirk played across his lips as he found that she didn't notice him at all. He peeked over her shoulder and found her stirring a bowl of melted chocolate. Next to her is a dish full of fresh strawberries and parchment paper lined with chocolate-covered strawberries.

He purposely reached over her shoulder to one of the chocolate covered strawberries before plopping it into his mouth.

"It's good." He evaluated, while licking the chocolate off his fingers and chuckling at Alina's astonished face. Her eyes went round upon seeing him and it took her an extra second before she reacted to him.

"How-, wait." Alina's jaw slacked as she tripped over her own words. "Why are you still up?"

"I could say the same for you. What are you doing up at this hour, young lady?" He pointed to the clock that said 1:32am, while rinsing his hands.

Hank found Alina's jaw clenched as her eyes quickly darted to the floor, before facing him with a slightly guilty expression.

"Sorry," she replied back, rubbing her arm while continuing to dip the strawberries in the chocolate. "I couldn't sleep again."

"Did I wake you?" She looked up again from the strawberries, eyebrows furrowed together as her voice was laced with worry.

"Nah, kid," he said back. "This is just normal. Sometimes I just wake up in the middle of the night."

Hank gestured to the strawberries.

"What about you? Why are you making you chocolate strawberries?"

"Oh, I was preparing dessert for tomorrow's bento box." She grinned back.

"Bento, what the heck is that?" He went for another chocolate covered strawberry, but Alina quickly pulled back the parchment paper with a pout on her face.

"It means lunch box in Japanese." She pushed the chocolate bowl closer to her too and cast a suspicious glance at Hank's hand before working on more strawberries.

He took a sweep of the rest of the kitchen. There was a container of steaming hot rice sitting on the kitchen table, a recently cleaned pot sitting on the dish rack alongside three stackable plastic rectangular containers that he didn't recognize. _I'm assuming those are the bento boxes? And sheesh, was she working on lunch in the middle of the night?_

"You don't have to make tomorrow's lunch, you know?" He raised his eyebrows at her, but she was still focused on the last five strawberries. "Dinner was delicious already. You did good, kid." It was the second time that he complimented her on her cooking, but it was nice to see that she was still smiling back at the comment.

"I want to," she replied back while glancing at parchment paper strawberries. "Besides, I'm used to making lunch for my mother."

"You made lunch for your mother often?" He inquired as he leaned his back on the kitchen countertop.

"Yeah, all the time since she wasn't really home enough," she said back casually.

"And you were just used to it? Making lunch for your mother all the time?" _Most teens wouldn't care, and usually wasn't it the other way around? Mothers are usually the ones packing lunches for their kids._

"Yeah, it's normal." She shrugged back.

Hank watched as she finished dipping the last strawberry with chocolate and put the remaining melted chocolate into a Ziploc bag. She then cut off the tip and started piping the chocolate into zig zag patterns onto hardened strawberry chocolates.

The strawberry chocolate looked like the ones you could order off the net. Within some of the zig zag patterns occasionally she'd put dots, hearts, or little stars. He found himself in awe at her technique as she didn't falter at all during the entire process.

Alina suddenly jumped up after finishing the last of her piping, "Oh yeah!" She quickly threw away her used Ziploc bag and then turned to him with eager eyes.

"Is it alright if I bleach your bathroom?"

That...was not a question Hank expected, "Ummm, why do you want to bleach my bathroom?"

Alina looked sheepishly at the ground while tapping her fingers together, "Uhhh, I-uh-not saying your bathroom is bad, but it could look better? I,um, just _really_ wanna refurbish it." She gave him a pleading look while he just stared at her.

Hank looked at her, flabbergasted. Alina, noticing Hank's shock, quickly spoke up, "Your bathroom is really nice! Really! I just want to make it look shiny and new!"

He didn't respond right away, as his mind was still wrapping around the idea.

"I promise I won't make it look worse," she said, trying to persuade him. "I've done it before at my home all the time. I clean really well, I can prove it!"

He blinked a couple of times back at her, while he thought through everything. _Well, my bathroom is already not in the best of shape. It can't be any worse, right? Wait. Is it really that bad looking? Of course it's a little shabby I guess? But not that bad right?_

He snapped out of his train of thought, and found that Alina's pleading eyes were still trained on him. He finally mumbled out, "Sure, go at it kid."

She gleefully smiled , "You won't regret it."

As soon as he saw that smile, he thought, _Oh, I kind of already do._

He then went to the restroom and just as he closed the door he heard her say something again.

"I'll clean and vacuum the living room too if that makes you feel better!" (dialogue coming from another person needs to be a space down)

Hank simply shut the door behind himself, rubbed his hand over his tired eyes and silently wondered about his fate. It was, what, 2 am in the morning? And already on the kid's second night here, she was doing so much. The fried rice was amazing, he hadn't had a good home-cooked meal in a while. Next thing he knew, she was working on lunch in the middle of the night and putting together mouthwatering chocolate strawberries.

_Now she wants to clean his house?_ Hank chuckled to himself as he moved his hair away from the front of his face. He picked up one heck of a kid from the streets. Her parents were incredibly lucky to have raised such a diligent person. She was like a workaholic.

He wished he could say the same for himself. He sighed and stared at his reflection in the mirror. His hair was unruly, a coffee stain taking up the bottom right of his worn out grey T-shirt, and his old age was clearly not helping the bags underneath his eyes. The picture perfect image of a drunk ass with his life all over the place.

He was getting better though. Ever since Connor stepped into his life, he started to get to work on time, cut back on drinking a bit, and actually started to be nicer to his colleagues. But Hank always wondered if it would be enough, if he could really change himself around

-to that same man he once was in his prime years.

He hoped that Alina would stay the same way as she was right now, that she wouldn't face any more hardship that would have her turn out like him. _Hopefully she'll get a nice family that adopts her._ He would hate it if such a bright kid had to stay in the foster system, tossed around like a rag doll.

_Alright, enough of this crappy talk._

He quickly splashed some water on his face, wiping the excess with a towel and then finally used the restroom When he stepped out of the bathroom, he found the kitchen neatly tidied up already. Connor did the same for him when the boy first moved it. The boy had rearranged his kitchen into a more 'efficient' formation, cleaned up the dishes quickly after every meal, and made everything look shiny new. _It's always the kids, huh? The next generation that would make things better than the last._

Alina was now plopped on the sofabed and she had the TV turned on to the prerecorded Detroit Gears games.

She turned to him and asked, "Do you want to join me?"

Alina's eyes lit up when Hank took a seat next to her and they decided on watching a game that happened a week ago. Just like yesterday, Alina nodded off after about half an hour into a game. At this point he wasn't sure if she actually enjoyed watching basketball or found it boring enough to use to fall asleep.

Regardless, he was prepared for her sleep endeavors this time, propping up a pillow on his right shoulder in case she fell asleep on top of him. He also placed one on his lap on the chance that her head would roll off. After putting up a third pillow behind his neck, he turned off the television and eventually dozed off.

* * *

Hank woke up to the smell of eggs and coffee wafting around in the living room. He was currently sprawled on the living room couch with Alina nowhere to be seen. He assumed that it was her cooking, considering that he smelled seasoning dancing in the air instead of smoke.

"You did it!" He heard Alina say cheerfully. "Seeeee, it's only a little bit burnt. It only took a couple of tries."

"Five, you mean," Connor said back dejectedly.

"Sumo likes them though!" Alina enthusiastically replied, most likely in an attempt to cheer him up.

"Sumo likes almost anything."

"Woof!" The old St. Bernard barked excitedly, probably in response to the mention of his name.

"I'll eat it," Hank said, raising his arm up to volunteer as a tastetester. He got up to see two very flustered kids staring back at him from the kitchen. A smile erupted from Alina's face as soon as she saw Hank heave himself off the old couch.

"Good morning Hank!" Alina said, waving a hello with the spatula in her hand.

Connor on the other hand looked nervous and seemed fidgety when he handed over his fried eggs to Hank. He sucked in a breath before braving a bite into Connor's fried egg. He bit into the egg, and surprisingly...it was good. There was also a bit of seasoning on it and only the fringes of the eggs were burnt. He chowed down on the rest of it and gave Connor an approving thumbs up.

"Not bad son." Hank watched as the edges of Connor's mouth quirked up to a smile.

Alina quickly turned to Connor smiling brightly, "Good job!" She put her hands up as if to go into a 'high five' motion. Connor on the contrary, did not understand her actions and tilted his head in confusion when she tried to high five the android. She ended up gesturing for Connor to mimic her, to which he hesitantly put his hands up.

"High five!" Alina said, giggling as she gently slapped both their palms together. Albeit it was initially a bit awkward, but once the girl explained it was a way of expressing happiness, the android tried it a couple times more. To Hank, it was like watching a toddler learn something new and become _slightly _obsessed with a new skill under their disposal.

"I think I quite like high fives," Connor said, after doing it for a third time. "It's like a mini exhilaration." The two did one more set of high fives with a 'Yay!' at the end before Hank cut off their little culture lesson.

"Alright you two. Let's get breakfast moving along."

The pair finished cleaning up the kitchen and then Alina brought Hank what looked like a bowl of pudding.

"It's Korean Steamed Egg, give it a try." She placed on the dining table a bowl of her own and cut into the yellow custard-like material with her spoon.

Hank did the same and marveled at how easily he was able to cut into the yellow substance. He brought up the jiggly custard to his mouth and found the egg melting in his mouth. It had a mild savory taste with a tint of sweetness. _This was good, even better than any normal boiled egg._ He dived into the custard a second time and was astounded by how his spoon could bounce off of it.

"Do you like it?"

Hank looked up to Alina staring intensely at him.

"Of course," He responded. "It's really good. I don't have much culinary knowledge, but I would give it 5 out of 5 stars. Did you really just make it this morning?"

"Mmhmm!" She proudly hummed. "It's really simple though. All I needed was some eggs, soy sauce, salt, sugar and water. Then I mixed it all up and steamed it."

She then gently tapped the edge of her bowl, "The only tricky part is estimating the same amount of water as eggs mix to have a good consistency. That's how you get that nice texture from mixing all the ingredients together. I also added some seasoning on top."

Connor suddenly leaned forward and eagerly pointed to their bowls, "Can you teach me that too?"

She happily agreed and then started to spill out other egg recipes that she learned for the rest of breakfast. After breakfast, the trio got ready for Hank and Connor's work shift.

They later ended up clocking into the precinct just around 10:07 am, to Connor's disappointment, who wanted to arrive on time exactly at 10 am. The day went on like usual with looking over cases and analyzing them. The only slightly abnormal thing was probably Alina just sticking around their desk for the majority of the day. He trusted that she could look after herself, while Connor and him attended briefings and whatnot.

For the morning, they looked into Serendipity's and Eris's social media accounts, as well as those anyone related to them. They managed to contact Eris' family as well to tell them about the unfortunate news. Apparently they didn't keep in contact with her after Eris started college, but were still stunned by the sudden revelation of her death. The parents and younger sister agreed to an appointment to talk about Eris and any potential enemies she had. Hank and Connor also had to make several calls to set up interview appointments with several of Eris' other friends and acquaintances.

Hank considered the biggest pain in the neck: the community college that Eris went to. Sometimes killers ended up being those people that you only encounter briefly in some random setting. The victim wouldn't recognize the encounter as something big, but the killer could interpret it as otherwise. It could take days to screen the number of people Eris encountered at her college. Man, he couldn't _wait_ to have to talk to all these people. He inwardly groaned just at the thought of the amount of notes and information he'll have to take in.

The one good thing so far that they had on this recent case was an idea of what happened. Hank and Connor pieced together that the intruder or intruders must have made several runs to Eris' house and potentially either managed to outline the house structure from those runs or have a blueprint of the house.

All of the ventilation shafts and majority of the house crevices that allowed natural air flow into the house were intentionally sealed with either rocks, dirt or moldy leaves. The fact that the house ran on an Exhaust-Only Ventilation System only heightened their suspicions. This type of ventilation system expelled stale air from the house without providing a specific source for replacement air. Make-up air usually infiltrated the house from leaks in the building shell and through intentional passive vents. Another concern that Hank had about Exhaust Ventilation Systems was that along with fresh air, they can also draw in pollutants such as fumes from an attached garage.

_They knew._

That was the first thing that popped into Hank's head when he heard about all the major ventilation spots being covered up. These intruders knew about the layout of the house and its specific type of ventilation system. It would have been too much work for one person alone to handle all the research and preparation done on this house alone. But for the final act, it might have just been one person in the very end.

Another thing Hank and Connor pondered about was the extent of the research the intruders did on this household. Did they choose that specific day because they knew Eris' schedule? Was this a a stalker situation? How much did these intruders know about Eris' social network? Did they know that he and Connor were the ones on this case and would try to impede their investigation?

Hank took a deep breath and leaned back on the DPD chair while stroking his beard. _What the hell, man._

The analysis of the metal used to pick the lock wasn't much help either. It was a common steel metal manufactured in Detroit, found even in the everyday paperclip.

Other than that, they knew that the intruders were very well-versed with engineering. They understood the mechanics of an Exhaust Ventilation System, the wiring behind a thermostat and the workings of a gas furnace. He and Connor were probably going to have to scout around Detroit for companies or shops that deal with thermal engineering. Maybe look into employee lists once they narrowed things down a bit more? Should they look into the ones near the community college first?

He racked his brain some more on the pile of stuff he'd have to look into with this one case alone before giving a tired sigh. _All in a day's work._

"Why don't we take a lunch break?" Connor said to him, while placing a new cup of black coffee onto Hank's desk. "Taking a break is good for your mental health and it helps to have a fresh pair of eyes look over everything."

"Sure, why not?" He gruffed. "Let me show you the famous Chicken Feed, kid."

He slowly got up to go out, but noticed that the two kids didn't move.. Instead, Connor was helping Alina pull out something from the bag they brought from home. _A 3 layered lunch box? _She had two sets and pushed a blue set to Hank's desk.

"I made you lunch too!" Alina said smiling sweetly and opening her own purple lunch box. She opened the top compartment to reveal a previously hidden thin compartment set with a spoon, fork, and chopsticks. Then, the next one had small pieces of fried chicken, ketchup dip to the side, and some lettuce with cherry tomatoes. The following compartment had steaming white rice. Finally, the last large compartment had some cloudy soup with greens and cubes of tofu.

"Wow," Hank took a seat right back down and opened up his to reveal the same thing. The only difference was that his lunch box had yesterday's beef fried rice instead of white rice like Alina's. _It must have been leftovers._

"Is this the bento box you were talking about yesterday?" He asked.

She nodded back enthusiastically and proceeded to talk about each dish compartment.

"The bite size fried chicken here is called 'karaage'. I had it paired with leftover fried rice from yesterday." Alina then pointed to the cloudy greens soup. "This is called miso soup. It's a bit towards the salty and savory end, so Connor kinda didn't want me feeding you this. But I managed to convince him otherwise with the greens. Don't worry! I made sure not to overwhelm it with leaves, they are really mushy and you won't even notice when you swallow them."

He simply raised an eyebrow at the cloudy and misty soup substance, but took a sip regardless.

He then quickly clasped his hand over his mouth in shock. _It was good._ He wished he had more words to describe it, but he couldn't. All he knew was that the more he drank of this 'miso soup', the more he craved it. True to her word, the soup was very smooth and slipped right through his mouth. It left this warm and fuzzy feeling in him too. Chicken Feed was nice and always had a place in his heart, but this was different. It felt like the food that a mother would give, with lots of love and care, even if it wasn't perfect.

Hank then took a bite of the 'karaage' fried chicken, and found that there was a light crispiness in its texture while the inside meat was incredibly tender. He peeked over to Alina eating hers and found that the ones in her boxes were slightly more darker and a bit burnt compared to his. _Did she give the better batch to him?_ He quickly picked up two from his own batch and exchanged them with the burnt ones from Alina's.

She looked up from her meal in surprise from the sudden gesture and gave a confused look.

Hank on the other hand, stuffed his mouth with the newly acquired darker fried chicken pieces and huffed out, "These are better." He heard her give a light chuckle back and saw the edges of her mouth curl up slightly into a smile.

"The chocolate strawberries are in the fridge, you can have more of those."

"50-50," he said

She paused, maybe to consider Hank's suggestion, and later replied with a mere 'alright'. The smile of her face suggested she was amused by the idea.

Meanwhile as Hank and Alina were eating lunch, Connor was still meticulously looking over the recent case information. Hank had to remind the boy to take a sip of thriuim or take a breather even if Connor didn't need to eat.

When Connor pulled out the thirium packet though, the boy stared at the packet for a bit with his mouth agape. Connor looked to Hank in slight confusion, before revealing the other side of the thirium packet with a smiley face emoji.

"Ahhh, I added that to your packet." Alina explained after wiping her mouth with a napkin. "I didn't want you to feel left out at meal time. So I added an emoji sticky note."

"What do you think? Do you like it" She asked hesitantly with an earnest expression.

Connor suddenly straightened up, took a piece of tape from Hank's desk and tapped the bottom part of the sticky note down onto the thirium packet before giving a gleeful smile.

"I do, it's a neat touch to the standard packet." Connor then gently rested his fingers on his chin, "I wonder if Markus would like this idea for Jericho. I feel like it would make the packets look more friendly. Maybe Simon will like it too?"

Suddenly Tina peeked over the trio's shoulder on her tippy toes with a curious expression.

"Oh, what's this? It smells nice. Is that fried chicken?" Tina leaned forward some more to get a closer look. "It looks as good as it smells."

She then erupted in a series of follow-ups, "Oh! Is that star shaped tofu in miso soup? That's so cute! Pearson, come look! Who made these? They're different from your usual, Hank."

"Alina made them, she's a real talented cook," he said proudly.

Gavin then popped over right next to Tina, probably checking out all the commotion.

"What? Pipsqueak made that?" Gavin commented with a haughty look. "That's some classy ass food there, no need to lie old man."

Hank saw out of the corner of his eye Alina puffed up her cheek while casting an annoyed glare at Reed.

"Nope, I've witnessed the kid's cooking firsthand. She's a good home cook."

Tina nudged Gavin with her arm, a cocky smile on her face, "What, are you jealous that a kid cooks better than you?"

Pearson finally came over from her corner of the DPD, eyes brightening up at the sight of bento boxes. She instantly took out the camera function of her phone and excitedly asked if she could post them on her instagram while crediting Alina.

"These look amazing!" Pearson raved while taking a picture of the miso soup. "It's that cute bento box design that's designed to keep things warm, right? That's why you put the miso soup on the bottom and then rice and finally the chicken. The steam from the bottom ultimately affects the overall thermal temperature. Genius idea that I always loved with cute bento boxes!"

Pearson then snapped a picture with Alina and the rest of the bento boxes.

Alina then perked up, "Oh, I have chocolate strawberries too with some simple designs too if you wanna take a look!"

"Yes!" Pearson pumped her arms in excitement and the two headed to the side of the precinct where the kitchen fridge was.

Meanwhile, Tina was still teasing Gavin back at Hank and Connor's desk.

"Come on, admit it!" She playfully batted at him once more and Gavin swatted her away.

"Psh, whatever." Gavin grumbled back before going back to his desk. Tina simply rolled her eyes after seeing Gavin leave.

The three of them then stared in silence at Pearson's and Alina's direction who were feverishly talking in the kitchen. They were out of earshot, but you could see them laughing and smiling while taking pictures.

Tina finally broke the silence, "She sure is a great kid."

"She is. She already offered to help around the house." Hank chomped down on another piece of fried chicken. "She cooked yesterday's dinner, today's breakfast in addition to this lunch. And apparently she wants to vacuum my house too."

Tina stared wide eyed at Hank, clearly taken back from the long list of Alina's ambitions. Connor looked baffled as well and spoke up about his confusion.

"Wait, she wants to vacuum the house? When did she say that?"

"Last night?" Hank casually took another zip of miso soup, relishing the salty but mellow taste. Hank sees Connor's face pull into a sulk. The boy is pouting some more while leaning back and folding in his arms.

"It seems you guys have been bonding over late night sessions." Connor's expression turned even more mopey while furrowing his eyebrows, "I wanna join in too."

"No one's stopping you." Hank laughed back softly. "It's more like I sorta find her still awake after I wake up in the middle of the night."

Connor still narrowed his eyes and determinedly said, "I'm joining."

Hank shrugged back, "Whatever."

Tina pipes up as well, disbelief in her voice, "I can't believe she just offered to vacuum for you."

Connor's LED flashed bright yellow as he followed up, "I might have to tell her that I already vacuumed Sunday, it should help lighten her load though."

Hank picked up another spoonful of fried rice and put it into his mouth. "Yeah, she's a real good kid. Lucky you, get to have her next week."

"You sure about that?" Tina playfully said as her eyes glinted. Connor tilted his head in response while Hank stared at her.

"I don't know~" Tina grinned some more. "I feel like a lot of unexpected things can happen."

"What are you getting at?" Hank wiped his mouth with a napkin. "The kid can't stay with me. I'm a bad influence. She's doing a better job than me in the past 2 days."

Tina shrugged her shoulders and twirled the pen in her hand. "I'm just saying. She was awfully attached to you and Connor on the first day. She insisted on being with you two."

Hank pinched his nose with the tips of his fingers, "That's cause Connor said some random bullshit."

"Hey!" Connor defensively shouted.

Hank pointed two fingers over to Connor, "You're still not off the hook for randomly inviting someone to our house."

Connor was taken back, twisting his mouth into a pout again.

"I know, I know. You were doing the right thing, kid." Hank added on and watched as Connor's shoulder relaxed some.

Tina let out a huff after watching the exchange. "Welp, just appreciate her while you still have her right now."

Hank flicked his fingers back in a light hearted manner, "Will do."

* * *

Author Thoughts:

Soooo elllo! I started reading on Webnovels and they really helped with story inspiration and what I thought was really neat was tht at the end of every chapter was a Creator's Thoughts panel on the chapter so I thought I could do that too and you guys could react to it if you wanted to.

Uhhhh I regret deciding to write 10 pages for one chapter XD Man, i think my creative brain is like blahhh right now and like the quality went down i feel like after writing so much? XD hopefully not as much as I hoped, that last part was hard to write, the lunch scene. But i hope this gives some perspective on Alina's personality

Aiya, Hank. Even after being a month with Connor, he still got some self esteem issues. (T^T)/ Dont worry dear, we know you are working hard to get yourself together. And nooooo, u gotta be that fam to Alina, dont let her be in that foster system. (Done some research on foster systems, some foster families r amazing though. But more often than not, the kid usually gets settled in and then has to move families again and it affects their mental health. I would say there would be a high chance in tht situation with alina in detroit's situation rn)

Connor learned new skills!

Connor learned 'high five!' Lvl 1

Connor learned 'fried eggs' Lvl 1

Lol its like a video game setting thing where u acquire new skills

Why did i spend so much time on food? I think its cuz im craving good food during quarantine XD

Random fun fact: i spent a good couple of hrs googling wats a typical work day for a police detective, i swear imma start getting ads on the police academy

Q&A Session: Do you guys have a favorite fried chicken place? And which one and why? Very random, but I'm curious. If the q&a session is weird, XD feel free to just pop in the word 'kudos' or a smiley face :) that works too. Not sure if this slice of life with slight fluff is good or not lol


	10. Cleaning Time

Ello lolll, this chapter took a while to write. Also like i'm starting to regret writing 4k per chapter, it is taking a toll. Might cut back a bit for each new chapter. I also apologize if the grammar is off to some degree, there was a lot of dialogue and fill in scenes that was difficult for me to do. Also because I've been getting into fights over family a lot these days because of the quarantine life still sort of being in effect.

Shoutout to Veira-Raven, RandomUser, and Guest for the amazing reviews. Also welcome VieleDLR18 to the favorites/follower fam!

* * *

-Wednesday December 15th, 2038 — 7:30pm

Connor was currently watching Alina re-cook some pre-packaged thick white udon noodles in their kitchen. He had wanted to help cook dinner, but Alina quickly dismissed him saying that he should rest for the day. When he questioned if it was because of his cooking skills, she simply smirked and playfully hinted that she felt that they already had enough cooking lessons for the day.

So Connor ended up just sitting in the kitchen, watching Alina rush back and forth. One moment she's at the stove, then she's zapped over to the cabinets for some seasoning all while occasionally glancing at the pot of udon noodles. If Connor had to make an analogy, he would compare her to a busy bee jumping from flower to flower. Well, in this case it would be from one corner of the kitchen to another.

He also found it interesting how she would cut out stars from the carrots, hearts from the white fish cakes, and then mince the leftover residue from the shape making. It made him squirm in his seat to have to watch from the sidelines, and soon he found himself right behind her to overlook her cooking.

When Alina finally went to grab seasoning to her left, it seemed that's when she finally noticed his presence. She jolted up, eyes wide and dangerously almost dropped the kitchen knife from her hand. Connor quickly made a grab for her right arm and gripped the kitchen utensil handle before it fully loosened from her hold.

Holding a hand over her chest, Alina breathed out, "Oh my god. How long were you there for?" With her left hand, she wiped her forehead, shock still written on her face, "I really needa get used to having someone else next to me."

She let out a sigh, placed the knife on a cutting board and jokingly said, "Is this some kind of stealth program I don't know about?"

She then took a pair of chopsticks and started stirring the thick white noodles boiling over in the pot, "Cause if it is, MAN are you good at it."

"It is one of my programs, but I'm not actively using it right now. That would be an inefficient way of depleting some of my thirium reserves," Connor replied and crossed his arms. "If anything, I think you should be more aware of your surroundings. If you're like this outside the house, you could be easily taken down by a surprise attacker."

Alina threw her head back at Connor and gave him a dubious look, "That's not going to happen, it's not like I'm anyone important. Besides, I'm only absentminded occasionally."

She stirred in some store bought soup base, carrot stars, heart shaped fish cakes and some asparagus to the mix. Then she started boiling another pot of water with two eggs. Once the hard boiled eggs were done, she cut out some bunny ears and added three sesame seeds for eyes and a mouth to make a cute egg rabbit. One ear ended up a bit disproportionately bigger than the other but it was kinda cute still in Connor's viewpoint.

The end result of the dinner course was thick white udon seeped in a light brown chicken broth. It was decorated with fun shaped carrots, fish cakes, a chubby egg rabbit and an asparagus floral arrangement. Alina had cut the asparagus ends to look like wheat stalks and others were swirled into circle spirals.

For Connor, it amazed him on how Alina made food into an art, while taking in its nutritional uses. He vaguely recalled one time while scrolling through the internet, that food decorating wasn't always just for fun, it tended to raise the appetite of consumers. Businesses would utilize this appeal to raise the prices of their food. It would take some extra time to prep the item, but it allowed some more profit as it heightened consumer expectations and they would give better quality reviews.

_Perhaps that is also what's making Hank eat more nutritional food here? _Though at the start of dinner, Hank looked stunned at the food bowl layout and muttered something along the lines of 'this shit looks too cute to eat.' Alina didn't say anything in response to the comment, but it seemed to have made her happy though. Even with her hand that attempted to cover her mouth, Connor could see Alina's smile beaming through the cracks in between her fingers.

After dinner, Alina got right to work on bleaching the bathroom. Connor watched her as she put on a rather funny get up that reminded him of the suit Hank wore for the Serendipity incident. She had put on a set of goggles, a face mask, a pair of yellow rubber gloves, Hank's shrunken grey jacket and a pair of baggy sweatpants. To be honest, she kinda looked like a determined scientist ready to tackle the next set of chemicals she had to work with.

Connor vaguely recalled off the top of his head, Alina getting these supplies yesterday at the grocery store. When he asked her why she was buying cleaning supplies for dinner, she winked at him and said that it was her second surprise, so he just went along with it. It appeared that she had been prepping even before getting Hank's permission.

Apparently during her nightly talk with Hank yesterday, that was when she got permission to clean and bleach the bathroom. Connor felt a bit perplexed that once again he was left out of their conversation. He felt like he was missing out on information. The first night it was about Alina's father, the second night it was the fact that Alina allegedly wanted to clean their house for them. This time, he was resolute to stay awake till 2am or 3am to be part of their talks.

For now, Connor was watching Alina as he leaned against the doorway frame. He had wanted to help too since he felt awkward having a guest be the one to clean the bathroom. However, Alina insisted on doing the task on her own, saying that it was the least she could do for letting her stay at their house.

She had set aside a bucket of water and appeared to have eyeballed a certain amount of bleach to pour in. Then she took down both the shower and window curtain and sunk them into the solution. Next, she pulled out a smaller, shallower bucket pan from underneath the sink and filled it part way with water. She measured out half a cup of bleach and poured it in as well. Subsequently, she dripped in vinegar and sprinkled some baking soda for a second solution.

Pulling up the long sleeves and rolling up, Alina scrubbed vigorously at the shower tiles with the vinegar solution starting at one corner and not missing a spot on the green titles. After what seemed like ages, which according to Connor's internal clock was only five minutes, Connor finally decided to don some cleaning attire himself and joined in the fray. He didn't need to have a face mask though since technically he didn't have to breathe, but still put on some gloves to protect his hands.

Connor decided also to take a read of the solutions to see how suitable it was for cleaning. He dipped a part of his gloved hand into the cleaning solution and tasted it with his mouth.

**[Processing Data. . .]**

**[Bleach(13.6%),Vinegar(3.5%), Baking Soda(2.3%) and Water(80.6%) Solution]**

"You should add some extra water. Bleach to water ratios tend to be at 1:30, meaning 3.33%. Having too much bleach in the solution could be bad for your health as the chemical fumes can harm you," Connor said as he reached for a brush with his left gloved hand. "I suggest adding . . ."

Connor was about to continue with his recommendation, but Alina was staring at him with a stunned look. Her eyes were fixated on his right gloved hand, still part way of being taken out of his mouth.

"Ahh," he reacted back. _That's right, I didn't tell her I could analyze crime scenes like this._ "I should have warned you prior that I can do lab tests in real time. Hank is uncomfortable with it, so I have him look away when I do it in crime scenes."

"Oh no, it's good," she quickly said with her hands up. Then, she rubbed her cheek with her shoulder in what looked like an attempt to scratch an itch. "Just slightly weird seeing it in real life. I can see why Hank… uh… sees the experience as rather unique?"

She pushed up her goggles and rested on the bathtub edge, "It also took me a bit to remember that you could do that."

Connor raised an eyebrow to her comment, "What do you mean?" As far as he knew, she was usually on the tablet and kept to herself at the station. He didn't recall Hank or himself mentioning this ability before.

She suddenly stiffened a bit and her eyes quickly glanced to the side, "Um, your co-worker mentioned it." She then began twiddling her thumbs a bit as Connor waited for a longer explanation.

"Yo-Your, um, one of the officers," Alina gulped as she continued answering. "They mentioned it to me once. I don't remember who though."

_Yup, I'm 80% sure that's a lie._ From what he analyzed so far, whenever she wanted to hide something about her past, she had a tendency to break eye contact with them and squirm under their gaze. Connor mentally filed away this moment into Alina's folder within his database, he could always use that for reference later.

Presumably to change the topic, Alina pulled her eyes away from Connor's gaze and quickly went to dip her brush back into the bleach solution for a second time. Connor swiftly grabbed her arm before it touched into the bucket, and in the process startled her.

Connor hastily explained himself as he released his grip, "You need to add 12.324 more cups of water or 98.592 fluid ounces to reach the correct bleach to water ratio. Using the bucket width and original water height level, from my calculations, you already have 3.676 cups of water."

Connor watched as Alina slowly retracted her arm back, but she wasn't as alarmed anymore. Her body seemed to have loosened up as he chose to pour in those 12 extra cups of water, instead of talking about the preceding conversation.

After he confirmed the solution with a second taste test, he took both of their brushes and immersed them into the bucket and handed Alina's back to her. She seemed a bit taken back by his gesture, but still took the brush and stumbled on her way back into the bathtub.

Alina took care of the left side of the shower tiles, while Connor cleaned the right side. They also took the time to scrub the bathroom titles by the mirror. For the dusty green paint regions, Alina had them switch over to a regular soap, baking soda and vinegar solution in fear of the bleach ruining the paint.

The two mostly did small talk while cleaning around. They exchanged opinions on music, with Alina explaining her love of J-pop and K-pop songs. Connor spoke about how he was still exploring and experimenting with different types of music. He was open to all of them, but he expressed that he seemed to prefer Classical music and Techno music the most.

They exchanged stories on how they found their music tastes. Alina described her love of anime songs hence why she listened to J-Pop, while her love of K-Pop came from the boy band BTS. She ended up on a mini-raving session about how each band member's personality shined through their voices.

Connor discussed how as a machine he initially interpreted music as just musical notes being translated from audio form. His systems would automatically analyze the music to describe its origins, songwriter, release date, genre. Then it would list out the music notes being played. Now it was different, he would shun away the stats and just close his eyes to the tune. Usually he's listening to Jazz or Rock in the car , since those are Hank's favorites.

Connor softly chuckled as he recalled the memory of when he first came to Hank's house.

"Hm?" Alina turned her head curiously at Connor's sudden chuckle. "What's so funny?"

"I'm recalling when I first found out that Hank liked Jazz. It was because I broke into his house."

Alina stared at him for a bit with wide eyes, "What?"

Connor continued laughing as he replayed the memory file, "I thought something bad happened to him , since I saw Hank laying on the kitchen floor unresponsive. I ended up smashing through his window to get to him, turns out he was just drunk."

"And then?" Alina eagerly pressed on with a grin on her face.

"I slapped him actually," Connor sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck as Alina burst into a fit of laughter. While reeling in her fit of laughter, Alina almost ended up covering her mouth with her rubber gloved hands. She seemed to have realized at the last minute that they had bleach solution on them, so she resorted to smacking the worn out sweatpants as an outlet instead.

"I can't believe you slapped him!" She continued giggling, having to put down the brush because she was shaking from laughter too much. "How does this correlate with Jazz again?"

"I explored his house after helping him sober up and found a lot of Jazz Vinyl Records," Connor answered nonchalantly.

She nodded at him while smirking, "So you just casually walked around as if nothing happened after smacking Hank?" She shook her head some more with disbelief on her face. "That is just way too funny."

They continued exchanging amusing stories till they finished cleaning up everything. By the time they were done, the bathroom looked amazingly new and had a new shine to it. The shower titles appeared glossy enough as though it was recently polished. The once burnt out green paint also seemed more lustrous than the original state when Connor first arrived at Hank's place a month ago.

They both beamed at their work and shared a high-five to celebrate their achievement. Of course 5 seconds later, Alina rushed out of the bathroom, ripping her mask off and took a deep breath cheering 'Yes, finally fresh air!' Connor thought it was a peculiar statement because the bathroom window was open the entire time of their cleaning session. He supposed it was probably because he closed off his olfactory sensors prior to cleaning that the pungent bleach smell was actually much more oppressive than he predicted.

As a machine he didn't really care for smells, he simply registered what was in the air and it got listed in his peripheral vision. As a deviant, things were different though, all five of his senses were heightened. Certain sounds, smells or touch would leave different memorable impressions, such as the softness of Sumo's fur fluttering in between his fingertips. _That's right, we need to walk Sumo._

**[Connecting with Wifi System 'Fuckoff' . . .]**

**['Search Detroit, MI Hourly Weather']**

**[Siri-"There is an 89% chance of light rain for the next couple of hours from 10PM onward to 2AM"]**

Connor quickly went into his room. He changed into a pair of light brown cargo parts, pulled on a navy blue hoodie and topped everything off with a waterproof black jacket. When he came out of his room, he saw that Alina had changed too; however, she was dressed in one of Hank's old DPD sweaters that looked like a pajama dress on her. When she saw that Connor was in outside gear, she initially gave a blank stare, but then furrowed her brows in confusion.

"I'm taking Sumo for a walk," Connor picked up one of the leashes sitting on Hank's bookshelf. "Want to join me?"

Alina rapidly shook her head up and down, before racing away to presumably change into a new set of clothes.

"It's going to rain, so dress warmly!" He shouted as Alina rushed into the spare 'storage room' with Tina's set of clothes just taken out of the dryer. In the meantime, apparently Hank had approached the bathroom before he could warn the older man about the smell.

"Hank!" Connor called out as he ran over to the bathroom, only for Hank to reach there first and the two were run over by a cloud of bleach fumes. At first, Hank staggered back from the sudden wave of bleach gas, but rapidly recovered and stood mouth agape at the newly done bathroom.

"You guys did all of this in one hour?" Hank said, his voice soft and halting in bewilderment as he surveyed the interior.

Hank pulled open the folded translucent shower curtain, which unlike before, no longer held the cloudy grey discolouration. The same was for the window curtain, the tiny black cross marks could be properly seen against its white backdrop.

Hank turned around, smiling from ear to ear and gave Connor a pat on the back, "I'm proud of you two. You continue to amaze me every single time."

Hank peeked behind Connor, "Now where's the other rascal?"

"Right here!" Alina cried out to them. Her head popped in from the side of the bathroom doorway, grinning while pulling down the rest of a light blue hoodie sweater over her T-shirt.

Hank chuckled at the sight and helped pull down the sides of the hoodie. He then fondly ruffled Alina's semi-curly hair, which was already in a bit of an unruly mess.

"I'm proud of you, kid. I was a bit skeptical at first, but I guess I shouldn't have doubted you."

Alina playfully sulked, crossing her arms, "I told you I could do it."

Hank smiled back and gently patted Alina's head again, "Now get a move on, Sumo's getting all angsty."

Alina beamed at Hank's affectionate pat and happily hopped away to the living room while the other two followed closely behind.

Connor coaxed Sumo to the doorway and the St. Bernard instantly knew they were going for a walk. Connor picked up a big black umbrella, large enough for two people, and handed it over to Alina. Then he dug out a spare plastic poncho raincoat from one of Hank's bookshelves, instructed Alina to lift her arms and fitted it over her.

Alina scrunched her face and peeped over to the window, "Is it going to be bad?"

"Only light rain, but the plastic film from the raincoat will do a better job of protecting you than just the umbrella alone," Connor latched the leash onto Sumo and put on his pair of heavy duty leather rain boots. After that, the two set off to walk Sumo while the overcast clouds started to build up in the night sky.

* * *

-Wednesday December 15th, 2038 —9:45pm—Riverside Park

Connor thought it was strange, how he found solace in the very location where Hank almost shot him. Somehow, on occasion during Sumo's walks, he ended up in Riverside Park just by the Ambassador Bridge and today was one of those days. Of course, during one of his walks with Hank, the older man apologized about his behavior, which made the location feel slightly more amiable to Connor.

Connor had just released Sumo from his leash, and the older dog was relishing his freedom by inspecting all the nearby weeds hidden within the park. Now it was just Alina and Connor sitting on one of the park benches by the playground.

Connor took a look at the sky, which was looking more ominous than when they left the house, and decided to pull Alina's hoodie on top of her head in case it started raining. She gave him a puzzled look at the sudden gesture, but when he pointed to the sky she nodded in understanding.

"Can I ask you a personal question?" Connor asked politely.

Aina looked at him stunned, blinking a couple of times, before she broke out giggling.

"Of course, what's up Connor?" Alina said, pulling up one of her knees to her chest.

Connor quickly looked up to the sky, a bit confused at her question until he realized it was one of the rhetorical questions Chris had told him before. 'What's up' was simply a way of casually greeting someone else or asking someone what was worrying them.

"Do you-" Connor paused, silently wondering if he should rephrase his sentence. "Do you miss your parents?"

Alina instantly looked to the ground at the mention of her parents, just like all the other times Connor brought up her past. However, this time it was different, she wasn't squirming and deliberately avoiding eye contact like her previous mixed lies. This time, there was a mix of emotional expressions like uncertainty, pain, sadness and finally 'resolve'.

"I, I don't really," Alina said, pulling up her other knee to her chest and hugged her arms around them. "I guess that makes me a bad person, right?"

"I don't think so," Connor replied back. He studied how she curled into a fetal position, clutching her knees even closer than before. He noted that this was similar to how she acted back to the first night. He hoped by asking this question, he didn't destroy any progress they made so far in their friendship.

Despite refuting that she missed her parents, her body language seemed to state otherwise. _Was something else entangled in her past that was causing her to act like this?_ She seemed mature for her age, but it was times like this that she seemed to regress back a bit.

"I can't help it," Alina leaned her back against the bench with a grim and glossy expression. "They were never around. The _**only person**_ that I knew I could depend on was _myself_."

Alina paused and stared directly at Connor, "I don't blame them though, exactly. Well, for my mother at least." She took in a deep breath as her expression hardened.

"I think Hank already told you that my father was a gambler, so I made him divorce my mother."

Connor nodded back, "It was in the newly updated report. He was physically abusing her and you happened to see when he fought her for their diamond engagement ring. That's why your father wasn't around. The same for your mother, as a result of the divorce, she became the sole household income provider."

"It wasn't just that," Alina looked up into the night sky with a dazed expression. "Mum was obsessed. She was obsessed with bringing dad to his senses. Because she was a social worker, whose job was to fix families. But she couldn't fix her own."

As Connor watched as Alina's eyes drifted across the sky, he found her arms falling to the side, causing her to loosen her hold on her knees. The knees once tightly knitted to her chest, were now just barely propped up on the bench and her feet were halfway dangling off the side.

"She wouldn't come home as often," Alina's voice straining and a bit hoarse. "I don't know if it was because she didn't want to be reminded that she couldn't bring dad home properly. Or because of the dozens of social work sessions she attended about gambling and addiction."

Alina rested her arms on propped up knees. She crossed them to form a platform for her head to lay on, before speaking up again.

"Of course, she also took extra hours of work to pay the mortgage and car loans. So I understand that," Alina repositioned her head within her tangle of arms. "I just couldn't understand why she didn't let go of dad. Why she kept clinging onto the hope that he'll come back better. Why couldn't she _let go_ of him?"

Alina's grip on the plastic raincoat tightened, "He was a bad person. That was that. There's _no point_ in trying to make him change, when she tried so many times already. And. Every. Single. Time. She. Failed."

Connor didn't say anything back, he wasn't sure what to say. Human relationships sounded so complicated and it was concerning how the normally cheerful Alina broke into a fragile child distraught over her family. _What else was she hiding behind that bubbly facade? _

"Every time she thought he changed," Alina choked on. "He came back into our home and acted all sweet, like the dad I knew when I was 8. We would play board games and share hot chocolate." She buried her head into her arms, but luckily Connor could still hear her words properly.

"But money and jewels would go missing a couple of days later," Alina said, grinding her teeth. "And just like that, he would vanish too. She should have just cut him off."

Connor wasn't sure how to react or offer a semblance of a solution. _Should he give her a hug?_ She seemed to like those. But somehow the timing didn't feel right either. His mind whirred into potential ways Hank, Markus, Simon or Josh would comfort a person. He finally decided maybe to try Markus or Simon's gentle approach when Aina abruptly cut off his train of thought.

"I'm sorry," Alina said, as she suddenly straightened her posture. The many signs of weakness she previously showed before vanished as a blank expression took over. Her eyes no longer showed the fatigue and weariness of dealing with years of hardship. To some extent, Connor thought it was a bit eerie how she was able to instantaneously change her personality. Her blank expression reminded him of the days he was a machine, and didn't try to let any emotion get to him.

"What do you mean?" Connor replied back. Alina didn't do anything wrong, nor did she harm him in any way. _Why was she apologizing?_

"This is my problem, my family situation, my burdens to carry," Alina momentarily paused. "I shouldn't burden others with this information. It just sorta all spilled out."

"I don't mind. I don't think you're burdening me," Connor took out his quarter out of his pocket and played around with it as he tried to think of other ways of consoling her.

Alina gave him a wary look, "Everyone says that, but I know that everyone has their own set of problems they hide away. They already have enough on their plate that they're trying to resolve."

Alina sighed and let her legs fall to the ground, swinging them around, "But when I happen to accidentally slip something about my parents, they all wanna help. I don't want to make their lives any more difficult than it already is."

"While that may be true, I think sharing burdens is a part of friendship and camaraderie," Connor said back. Connor thought back to when he consulted Hank about not wanting to go back to Jericho because of all the guilt he had as a Deviant Hunter.

Connor continued talking as Alina silently watched him, "When I told Hank about my dilemma about not wanting to reside in Jericho, he gave me lots of advice. But most importantly he said that he appreciated the fact that I trusted him enough to consult him." Connor took a moment to see if the words were weighing into Alina and her attentiveness seemed to confirm that.

"I think your friends would have been that way too," Connor added.

Alina looked to her hands, fidgeting with them some more, "I did trust them, they were my escape from reality. The reality I wanted to run away from."

Connor noted that there was a sort of heaviness in the air after that, it wasn't from the rising humidity because of oncoming rainstorm-it was something else. The good thing was that Alina gave him a small smile afterwards and the heaviness seemed to dissipate after that.

"Thank you though," Alina softly whispered into the air. "For listening to my thoughts." There was another couple seconds of silence as they took in the scenery.

"Hank taught you well," She followed up as her smile glistened in the lamplight. "He must be very proud of you."

"I mean, it wasn't always like that," Connor rubbed his hands together. "I mean he almost shot and killed me here in this very spot."

"What?!" Alina shrieked, jumping out of her seat. She quickly took a few steps forward, examining the area by the railing. She then paused, looked back at Connor while putting her hands up in L shapes as if framing a picture of him on the bench. She tilted her head a couple of times as she studied the surrounding area with her finger L-shaped lens and nodded to herself a bit. He found it odd, but didn't question it.

"Why would you want to come back here then?" She questioned.

"Hank already apologized so I don't hold too many negative emotions against Riverside Park," Connor answered. "Besides, now this place is more of a pitstop for us right now when we want to escape from the city turmoil."

Connor stood up and walked up next to where Alina was standing by the railing.

"Every now and then, Hank would still apologize about his behavior, saying how unacceptable it was. And every time I would tell him that I already forgiven him," Connor closed his eyes as he recalled those past occurrences. "Hank would then go on a rant about how imperfect he was and how he wanted to be a better person for me."

Connor rolled the coin around his knuckles a bit more, "It's true that he's still imperfect. He still drinks, but we managed to reduce his weekly alcohol intake so far so I have hope."

Alina hummed back in agreement as she leaned her arms against the railing. She was silent for a couple of moments and then spoke up, "Have you ever thought about watering down the beer he drinks?"

Connor looked back at her curiously, stroking his chin, "How so?"

"Pour out some of the beer he drinks, and replace it with water," Alina replied, hunching her shoulders down. "Don't make it a dramatic shift though, like suddenly shifting from originally 100% beer to only 50% beer within a beer bottle. I say for the first time you try it out, make his beer bottles contain about 4% water and 96% beer. Then for the next week, slowly increase the percentage of water, so that it's 8% water and 92% beer. Then so on and so forth."

"It's not a bad idea, you may be getting onto something," Connor said. "Though knowing Hank, he'll probably notice right away the taste difference. I'll discuss it with him in the upcoming future."

As if almost on cue, telling them that it was late into the night, raindrops suddenly fell upon them and steadily increased their speed and rhythm. Connor quickly opened the black umbrella and yelled out Sumo's name as he scanned the area for the older dog. Alina joined him in calling out to the St. Bernard and soon they both heard Sumo happily barking as the dog bounded over to them.

"Good boy," Connor said, ruffling Sumo's wet fur as he put on the leash.

They were about to leave the park vicinity when Connor unexpectedly felt a tug on his sleeve. He looked back to see Alina staring off to the ground and attempting to hide the dark expression on her face while facing downwards.

"Thanks," She murmured. "For everything. Like the advice and all."

Alina looked up at Connor with a pasted bright smile, "I'm going to miss doing this next week." She pinched the bottom of her plastic hoodie together as if to better position it on her hair. Then she took the umbrella handle and leash from Connor's hands, before coaxing Sumo to follow along her strides.

For a moment, Connor stood dumbfounded by her remark, but he was able to swiftly recover enough in time to follow her pace.

"_I'm going to miss doing this next time."_

That sentence echoed in his mind as they kept walking. For that moment, even though he saw that pasted smile facade, he felt like he peeked into her other hidden persona-the vulnerable child.

* * *

Author Notes:

Ahhh Alina our girl, u slipping up every now and then about your prior knowledge.

I had her like BTS because it's a favorite boy band of two of my kinds, who r extremely into k-pop, so in honor of them 3

Ahhh, yes, Wifi Name being 'Fuckoff' XD don't u just love Hank

Also i just accepted the fact tht in the past few days somehow connor took sumo on walks bc i sorta realized tht i left out tht detail, and sorta plot hole XD bc i was too focused on relationship building.

And, ahhh our dear Alina, facing a toxic family relationship as a kid. Sometimes they are just too much, that you need to be able to cut them off. And ba dam dammmm, some more character development for our dear girl. Oof, maybe too much exposition. Soooooo, *drum roll*, any thoughts on how Alina sorta unhealthily handles her emotional problems?

And Q&A relating to our dear chapter, that might be a bit too deep, but what do you guys usually do to make yourself feel better when you guys feel sad? Do you guys stress eat by any chance? I end up stress eating a lot XD, and also ordering a lot of Oreos. This week I ordered lots of ice cream as well.

For the Q&A question that isn't tooooo deep, how's the weather on your guys end right now? For me, it's summer but we still get like a lot of rain and thunderstorms. Do you guys prefer sunny, cloudy, rainy, or snowy?

Or just leave a heart, an emoji, or the word 'kudos' if commenting is weird :D


	11. Bubble Bath

Hello! Hmmm, don't have as much to say in the beginning, other than I started writing a tumblr blog that gives a behind the scenes look on how i created certain scenes, the importance or hidden meanings in scenes, my thoughts on the plot and relationships, deleted scenes/concepts, fun facts. Link to it by clicking: here.

For a sneak preview of stuff I write in the blog, Fun Fact #2 that I wrote on the blog, paired with a ramen gif XD, was that part of the reason why I made Alina Asian was because I wanted the cooking scenes to have meaning and not just 'she cooked this'. I wanted there to be a step by step process while characters bond, but I only know how to cook Asian recipes and I didn't want to just like copy recipes from others(part bc thts just wrong & plagiarism) and it was easier to not have to deal with copyright when its ur mother's recipes tht you're writing about :D

Thank you to last chapter's commenters/reviewers for their never ending support! RandomUser,Guest, Veira-Raven

Last but not least, thank you to new follower+favorite folks, VieleDLR18, LTCactus,Ren-Chan4869

* * *

Connor let out an exasperated sigh at Sumo, whose fur was covered with mud. Luckily, the dog was quite obedient in letting them give him a bubble bath right now.

On their way back from the park, Sumo was actively splashing in almost every puddle they passed by. Alina didn't seem to mind being pulled along by Sumo, instead she had a soft expression on her face whenever Sumo made a pit stop at a puddle.

In Connor's opinion, seeing her gently giggle at Sumo's playfulness was better than the pasted forced smile she gave him earlier.

"_I'm going to miss doing this next week," Alina then pulled on her hoodie to hide what looked like a strained expression. He couldn't use his facial recognition program to properly analyze her, as she was covering half her face. But regardless, at the very least as a deviant now, he could tell that she was hiding her discomfort with the front she was putting up._

As Connor gently rubbed shampoo onto Sumo alongside Alina, he kept thinking about how Alina didn't seem to be honest with him. It was clear that she was upset, but instead she chose to give him the pretense that she wasn't. _Does she not trust me enough?_ Hank usually seemed to be upfront with his emotions, mostly with curse words.

_Well, it has only been three days._ But during this time, he thought he had really bonded with her over cleaning, cooking, gaming and just regular chatting. He especially liked playing with games with her during his breaks at the DPD.

They had played online apps of air hockey, tic tac toe, tetris, chess, etc. Of course he won the majority of their games, but on occasion he would let her win. Mostly, it was funny watching her sulk over losing and then she would rally herself up and go into competitive mode.

As of right now, Alina was gently layering and distributing the shampoo, happily humming with a genuine smile. Connor couldn't tell which song she was humming without the lyrics, so he simply catalogued the melody into her folder as another potential piece in finding her background.

It was nice to see that she was back in a better mood, compared to the walk back home in silence. The only sound on their way back was pretty much the steady pattering of the rain onto their umbrella and Sumo happily barking as the dog jumped into puddles.

Every time Connor tried to initiate a conversation, she simply looked away from his direction, leaving an uncomfortable stillness in the air as they strolled through the streets.

Connor gently took the soft towel from the sink counter, while Alina took a pail of water from the filled bathtub to pour onto Sumo. She slowly poured the water onto Sumo's back, lightly rubbing Sumo's back to expose more of the shampooed fur. Occasionally she would whisper words of encouragement, saying 'Sumo's a good boy' and the dog would respond back by rapidly wagging his tail.

After the rinse off came the hard part of drying all of Sumo's fur. Sumo seemed eager to get out of the bathtub. Even with the bathtub drained of water, with the amount of water soaked into Sumo fur, Connor knew the floor would be soaked if the made efforts to step out of the bathtub. They both took strides to quickly dry off the fidgety dog.

Once finished with drying, Connor handed a treat over to Sumo, thanking the dog for its patience. Sumo gobbled up the bacon health bar Connor bought for it, before leaping out of the bathtub with a trail of watery paw prints.

"Whew!" Alina said, plopping onto the bathroom seat cover. "I'm wiped out! Taking care of a dog is harder than I thought."

Alina was smiling brightly as if the conversation they had back at the park never happened. It greatly concerned him that she could just throw such a heavy topic away. He simply found himself frowning back in response.

Alina threw him a worried look, "Do you wanna take a shower first? Maybe that will make you feel more refreshed."

For a second, a part of him wanted to press on about her behavior, but from his negotiator programming he knew it might backfire.

"No," Connor replied back, flashing a smile. "You can go first." He could tell that Alina was hiding her fatigue. Even though she was doing a pretty good job of hiding it with her perky personality, her eyes were drooping, shoulders were sagging a bit more than usual and her breath was all ragged. Furthermore, he noticed that the more they had progressed with showering off Sumo, the slower her movements became.

Connor pulled off the plastic raincoat he wore that protected him from Sumo's potential splashing. Then he helped Alina do the same, though she had pretty much taken off 75% of it.

Once they finished up cleaning the bathroom, Alina took to the showers humming what seemed to be a rendition of 'What's up Danger?' from 'Into the Spiderverse'.

Connor on the other hand, changed into indoor clothes and took this chance to report to Markus for the week. After the revolution, Connor was always fearful of Amanda taking over if he ever met Markus in person or just visited Jericho in general, so he limited the amount of contact he made to Jericho.

Markus, however, insisted that if Connor wasn't going to make in-person visits to Jericho for non-DPD related business, then Connor should at least check in twice a week via wireless communication. If Markus was too busy, sometimes Markus would transfer Connor over to Simon or Josh for a weekly talk instead.

Earlier this week on Monday, Connor had already "checked-in" with Markus shortly after bringing Alina into Hank's home. Nowadays, he found himself often talking to Markus about his troubles and on any advice in regards to deviancy or emotions. This week was no different. He spoke to Markus about his confusion on why Hank didn't become furious on the idea of inviting a stranger to the house.

Maybe he could ask Markus about why Alina was purposefully avoiding a heavy topic after opening up. He had texted Markus throughout the week about various updates, many of them including information about the young companion who had newly joined the Anderson household.

Connor went into his private room, sinking into a navy blue bean bag chair Hank had gifted him to decorate his bare room. Connor had initially insisted that it wasn't necessary, that he would only use the room to enter 'resting mode' after a long day. The older man disregarded Connor's argument, saying that precisely because Connor's bedroom is a resting place, the bean bag chair was necessary. Hank asserted that the bean bag chair was much better than the creaky worn out bed especially after a long day of work.

True to Hank's word, Connor found himself often sitting on this bean bag chair, looking out his wide window. It was especially comforting during his talks with the folks at Jericho, like someone's warmth warped around his body. It reminded him that he was safe at Hank's place.

Connor took a glance at his internal clock, 11:37pm. _Would it be too late to call in right now?_

**[Calling RK200 #684 842 971 aka Markus]**

_**"Connor?" Markus answered on the other line of the call with a muffled yawn.**_

_**"Markus? Are you busy right now?" Connor tried to listen into the surroundings in an attempt to discern what Markus was last doing. "I can check in another day of the week."**_

_**"No, you're good," Markus replied back, this time his voice much clearer than before.**_

_**There was shuffling on the other side of the line, alongside the clatter of what seemed like metal pipes hitting cement pavement.**_

_**"I'm just going to move to a better location," Markus followed up, his footsteps echoing in the background.**_

Connor patiently waited, imagining Markus walking to the rooftop of one of Jericho's buildings. Markus had shown it to him once in the past, it was Markus' favorite place.

Markus had mentioned in the past that he enjoyed the view overlooking Jericho, reminding him of all the progress Jericho had made. It was also because there weren't many people there and he got to have some alone time there.

_**Finally, Markus' footsteps slowed down and Connor could hear the whistling of wind.**_

_**"I'm surprised that you're calling in and texting a little more frequently," Markus huffed out with a chuckle.**_

Somehow Connor could picture Markus putting up a playful smirk even with the heavy exhaustion weighing down the Jericho leader.

Connor quickly looked back at his texting channel with Markus, the former's words being correct. Connor normally only chatted every so often about updates in regards to android police cases. However, lately he realized he had been messaging sporadically about Alina: how he met her in a snowstorm, his theories on her background, the games he played with her and her cooking.

_**"I'm glad to hear that you made a new friend. Hopefully I get to meet her someday," Markus said warmly.**_

_**"About that. . .I wanted to ask you something about," Connor's mind floated back to the park conversation with Alina.**_

_**"Go ahead, I'm all ears."**_

Connor raised an eyebrow in response to what he assumed was an idiom, but swiftly moved his mind back to the park memory.

_**"Alina. . .She finally told me more about her family, and I won't go into the details for her privacy. But just when she was opening up, she like-" Connor grappled with the collar of his oversized T-shirt as he felt his chest tighten up. "She acted as if the conversation never happened."**_

_**"Like for a moment, it was as if I got to see the real her," Connor sank into the bean bag chair further. "Like she acts really mature all the time. But this time in the park, she seemed like a kid who was still figuring out the world."**_

_**Markus replied with a 'Mhmm', as if urging Connor to continue on.**_

_**"She wouldn't meet my eyes and kept silent the whole way home from the park," Connor added on. "She later perked up from giving Sumo a bubble bath, but didn't bring up the topic of her family again."**_

_**Connor shifted his position on the bean bag chair once more, "I understand that vulnerability causes us to close up, but it was like she just switched off a part of herself in an instant."**_

_**There was a couple seconds of silence on Markus' end and Connor heard Markus' shoes scrape off the cement.**_

_**"Connor," Markus responded back. "Is there something else that's bothering you too? I feel like there's more to the story that you're holding back on."**_

_**Connor sighed, resting his left hand on his forehead, "No?"**_

_**"Is that a question for me or you Connor?" Markus chuckled again.**_

_**"I guess," Connor paused, before letting out a puff of annoyance. "It's just frustrating that I feel like I haven't made much progress with befriending Alina the past few days."**_

_**"It's only been three days, Connor," Markus reasoned. "Relationships take time. And a lot of times when you're building one, it can be stagnant at first. But from what I'm hearing so far from you, I think you two are getting along fine."**_

_**Connor gave an aggravated grunt back, harsher than he originally intended. He quickly apologized, but Markus was much faster on the other side of the line, telling Connor that it was alright. The leader seemed to just know or understand almost everything about deviancy and how to deal with sparks of emotion in times like these.**_

For a couple of seconds there was stillness on Markus' end, so Connor took the opportunity to reach out to the work tablet sitting on a nearby dresser. After fumbling a bit to get the tablet, he managed to retrieve the device just barely out of his fingertips' grasp.

Connor opened up Alina's file on the DPD issued tablet, and took a quick look at the digital file that was growing in size with each passing day. A lot of the information was minuscule details, like notes about her habits that indicated she was most likely fabricating statements to them.

_**Connor spoke up again, breaking the quietness, "Lately, Hank and Alina have been having late night talks or something. And I feel like I'm missing out on vital information because they've always occurred when I'm asleep."**_

_**There was a light laugh from Markus, "You mean you feel left out?"**_

_**"What?!" Connor choked out.**_

_**"Well, I guess," Connor instinctively looked away to the side as if Markus were in front of him.**_

_**"Yes," Connor reluctantly said back, his arms tightly grasped around him. "But it's only because I find out more about her through second hand accounts and Hank's digital report updates."**_

_**Connor frustratedly ruffled his hair, "I mean, she literally refused to tell us anything about herself initially. I'm certain that when she was filling out the forms, she left out her original address and family information blank on purpose."**_

_**Connor then rested his arms on top of his knees, folding them over in front of him, "I didn't push her about it at first. I felt like it would have been better to have her reveal it later after gaining her trust."**_

_**"And?" Markus pressed on gently.**_

_**"T-This is the first time I felt like I really gained her trust," Connor reasoned, his arms slacking a bit. "She hadn't spoken to me about her family before. And suddenly that connection we were building. . .it just abruptly ended. I-I felt a little saddened by that, I believe?"**_

_**"Trust me when I say that you're doing a great job connecting with Alina already," Markus said in a soothing tone. "Some progress is better than no progress and the fact that you recognize these emotions means that you're also learning more about your deviancy."**_

_**Markus continued on talking, "Besides, I'm really proud that you're conversing with other people, other than just Hank and your co-workers. Having relationships within your work life is good, but it's always nice to have someone to talk with or just relax in general."**_

Markus was right in that Connor's social circle consisted solely of his work company. Connor never really had a reason to reach beyond it. He personally felt that all his needs were taken care of either with Hank or his fellow DPD co-workers. Plus, Connor found that doing DPD work was generally invigorating to him mentally.

If Connor did need to relax, he either went on a walk with Sumo or watched the TV with Hank. He never really needed anything beyond that. Though, lately his mini-games with Alina have been very satisfying. Markus' next set of words then broke Connor's train of thoughts.

_**"You should visit Jericho more, maybe bring Alina along too and introduce her to us."**_

_**Connor instantly froze, a cold unsettling feeling seemed into his chest, "I-I don't think that's a good idea."**_

_**"I think the number of times you've visited Jericho since the revolution is about the same number of fingers on my hands. And just going up to Jericho's gateway doesn't count!" Markus teased jokingly in the phone call.**_

Connor hung his head staring at his hands, the same hands that had held Markus at gunpoint **twice** and nearly killed the compassionate leader. He began clenching his hands, so much to the point that his nails left small imprints on his skin.

_**"I…I just don't feel comfortable," Connor eventually answered.**_

He **couldn't** bring himself to tell Markus about that dangerous moment on stage. Every time he tried to, some part of him held him back-**afraid** that it would break the friendship he built with Markus. Markus was one of the few people who reached out to him and was willing to give him the benefit of a doubt despite being a deviant hunter.

Connor wondered if he told Markus the truth, would Markus still want to be friends with him? He thought about the issue over and over again. Every time he worked up the courage to tell Markus, his voice modulator would just suddenly stop working. When Markus had an engineer examine the voice modulator's malfunctions, the engineer would tell them that there was nothing physically wrong with it. The only way the engineers could only explain the periodic modulator shut downs was deviancy stress.

_**"No one blames you for being a deviant hunter, Connor," Markus murmured out softly. "It was in your coding."**_

If Markus was physically standing in front of Connor, Connor was sure that the leader would have a reassuring hand on Connor's shoulder right now. Markus would tell him again that Connor had already proven his worth on that fateful night at CyberLife Tower.

_**"Talk to us," Markus stressed to Connor with a strain in his voice. "It doesn't have to be me either. You could talk to Simon, Josh or even North."**_

In his dimly lit room, Connor creased his eyebrows in response to that last comment.

_**"North?" Connor questioned with skepticism.**_

To Connor, she seemed like the last person willing to hear him out. She was always glaring at him from the sidelines and her expression turned dark whenever he appeared at Jericho. Simon and Josh on the other hand were a bit more open to him in a courteous fashion. He had talked to them once via phone call whenever Markus was too busy for a call-in.

John and Simon also sometimes helped with dealing with androids in emotional turmoil from being in DPD custody. It wasn't always Hank and Connor that were first responders to android cases and many androids were still on guard of human police officers.

_**"North. . .can be difficult at times, but even she can be reasonable when it's necessary. I'm sure you two will get along in the future with time," Markus remarked with a hopeful voice.**_

Connor didn't take the time to reply though. He was too focused on the fact that almost everyone in Jericho seemed wary and cautious of him other than Markus. Even if he wanted to take the chance to talk to other androids, he didn't feel ready for all the stares from any nearby androids listening into their conversation.

_**Markus exhaled a long tired sigh from Connor's lack of acknowledgement, "We'll wait for you. We'll wait until you feel ready to talk to us. Not just the four of us, but ALL of Jericho."**_

Connor wanted to counter back that there was no need for such a thing, but he knew Markus would stubbornly insist otherwise. Connor really didn't think he would ever be ready, he felt that it would be better just to continue limiting contact with Jericho for Jericho's safety. He would sacrifice the potential of building android friendships if it meant being able to protect his people.

_**"On a better note, Serendipity is fitting in fine since you last brought her over to Jericho," Markus cheerfully said.**_

_**Connor could feel the tinges of his mouth slowly curl up to a small smile, "How is she doing emotionally?"**_

_**"Well, she said that it was really helpful knowing that an android was in law enforcement," Markus expressed proudly. "You're doing a really good job with helping the android community in regards to DPD's android cases. Your reputation at Jericho is better than you think."**_

_**Connor took a shaky deep breath, clutching the middle of his loosely fitted shirt, "You don't have to be kind to me, Markus." His hand shook a bit grasping the raspy material, while trying to desperately hold back the layers of guilt of being a deviant hunter.**_

_**"I nearly killed you," Connor softly whimpered out, clasping his hands over his face.**_

_**"Connor," Markus sternly called out, with his voice echoing alongside the backdrop sounds of the wind. "I've already forgiven you and I'll continue to do so, even in the future if anything happens."**_

_**"This is why North suggests that you are too soft, Markus," Connor gently reminded. "I think I prefer her harsher stance towards me."**_

_**"You're being too hard on yourself," Markus huffed in annoyance for the second time in their conversation, "And North isn't always as fierce as you think. Don't worry, she thinks well of you too."**_

Connor stroked his face, nonchalantly saying 'okay' to appease Markus' argument or he knew this conversation wasn't going to go anywhere. They've done this multiple times to the point that he could probably predict their discussions whenever it went in this direction, even without the help of his code.

_**"Connor. Really, we're here for you," Markus repeated again, just as firmly as earlier in their conversation.**_

Connor knew Markus was a genuinely nice person and that words were not spoken for naught. However, he couldn't find himself confining to them about that incident on their emancipation day. He had only told Hank so far on what happened with Amanda.

The older man didn't completely understand the mechanics of how deviancy usually broke a programming code's hold, but Hank had been very supportive of him. Hank had been continuously telling Connor that it was alright to take things at his own pace. And right now, Connor _really_ didn't want to think about this.

_**"Let's, let's just stick to the cases," Connor said in an attempt to distract himself. Thankfully, Markus took the cue and didn't press on the other subject.**_

_**"You have already updated me on all you know about the android cases," Markus said in a calm tone, his voice turning back to his normal tranquil demeanor. "Serendipity is doing good overall. She's interacting with other androids in Jericho, making lots of friends and participating in lots of Jericho workshops or activities."**_

Connor relaxed at the thought of Serendipity fitting in with Jericho. She had been heartbroken during their question sessions, tightly gripping the engagement ring box to her chest during their talks.

Androids didn't really get eye bags as signs of fatigue, but he could tell Serendipity was emotionally exhausted as she usually held a glazed look. Connor let his shoulder slump down, his electronic muscle fibers finally able to loosen up a bit from his prior stressed out state.

_**"That's good," Connor uttered out, a smile forming on his face.**_

_**"Why don't we talk about something better? More cheerful?" Markus suggested. "What about all those cooking lessons you have been talking about?"**_

_**Connor playfully rolled his eyes, "You mean disasters?"**_

_**"I've been showing your cooking 'disasters' to the rest of the gang," Markus said while failing to stifle his laughter. "They enjoy the updates on you."**_

_**Connor widened his eyes, feeling his cheeks burn up, "What?!"**_

_**"Simon says you're welcome to visit him for any cooking tips," Markus continued laughing with what sounded like something muffling his mouth.**_

_**"Oh my god," Connor cried out, burying his face deep into hands. The rest of his DPD department knew about his cooking failures, but since he had been distant with Jericho they weren't aware of it. Until now.**_

"_**It's going to get a while to get used to this side of you," Markus amusingly said. "The great, almighty Detective Connor unable to fry an egg properly."**_

_**"I did get better on my 5th try though! Hank approved it!" Connor shouted back, his face still burning up.**_

_**"Alright, alright, whatever you say," Markus continued chuckling some more. "Give my regards to Alina, bring her around Jericho. We'll welcome her with open arms."**_

_**"I'll let her know," Connor said, while still groaning internally at the egg catastrophes being mentioned.**_

_**"Oh yeah. And Connor?" Markus piped up. "Give it time, I think she trusts you more than you think. Good night!"**_

_**"Good night," Connor cheerfully replied before closing the line.**_

**[Total Call Time with RK200 #684 842 971 'Markus': 15 Minutes and 5 Seconds]**

Connor took a moment to compose himself, before heading out his room to check if Alina was done showering.

As expected, when he opened up his bedroom door, he found it wide open for him to use. However, what he did not expect to see was Alina sleeping and curled up next to Hank on the couch bed. Her head was resting on a propped up pillow that Hank had situated on his right shoulder. A blanket was draped over her body and to _her_ right was a slobbering St. Bernard that was also in deep slumber.

Hank also had another couch pillow on top of his lap that didn't seem necessary. With Connor's preconstruction abilities, he could see that it was placed in that specific spot with Alina in mind. The idea was that with a 27% chance of Alina's head rolling off Hank's shoulder, her head would most likely land where Hank's couch pillow was and not startle her up.

Alina's face was also unusually flushed, her breathing was heavier and slower in comparison to the past when Connor found her in the morning. He deduced that she must have been tired out by today's events. It was more than their usual of just letting her cook. Today she also bleached the bathroom, took Sumo on a walk and also had to give the big dog a bubble bath. She deserved having that early rest.

Part of him was a bit disappointed to see that they weren't going to have their usual late night bit. _Just when I finally decided to stay up a bit later._ He went back to his room to get his shower gear and used the shower as an opportunity to cleanse his murky thoughts.

When Connor got out of the shower room in his pajamas, he was pleasantly surprised to still see Hank still up watching a previous Detroit Gears game. Connor went over to sit at the armchair to the left of the couch bed after putting his shower stuff away. When he sat down, he was greeted with the sight of the trio messily entangled in each other's arms on the couch. And . . . just like Markus said, he guessed what was feeling a bit left out? _Jealous, was it too?_

Hank seemed to have noticed though, the old man scouched a bit to the right and patted the extra space on the couch. Connor took the indication as a sign to tell him to come over to the couch bed. He plopped down to Hank's left and found himself following Alina's action of resting his head on Hank's other shoulder. Hank didn't appear to mind being sandwiched between two kids.

"You doing good, buddy?" Hank whispered.

"Hm? Yeah," Connor took a small square pillow off the ground and situated it between his head and Hank's shoulder.

"Sounded like something was up with your check-in earlier," Concern laced in Hank's voice.

_Wait, the conversation was supposed to be via internal wireless communication. Did I react too strongly that it became external?_ Connor tensed up, thinking about how much Hank had heard.

"It was just the usual," Connor mumbled back. "And also an egg catastrophe that was mentioned." Connor laughed at the last part, but not too much that it would wake up Alina.

Hank seemed satisfied with that answer, a smirk lining his face.

"Alright there buddy, but if you need a good talk you always got me."

Connor silently nodded back, content at how everything was right now: the Detroit Gears Game mellowing in the background inconspicuously, Hank falling asleep to his right, Alina peacefully entangled in their jumbo mess and Sumo slobbering up a storm.

_Things are . . . alright._

He felt a smile creep up on his face as his mind faded into the darkness.

* * *

Hmmm, i had a really hard time writing this chapter lol XD like i was deciding on the format on how i wanted to show internal dialogue communication between androids' voice calls vs like text messages and played around with things.

Ahh, yes the block quote, ended up being a result of my pondering. XD i didn't original intend for the block quote conversation to last so long. But here is the result *shrug* but also bc its sorta necessary for future stuff .~

Hmmm, as shown in the tags, this is platonic relationship between Markus and Connor simply bc they don't really talk too much initially-in like a formal manner mostly.

Damn I am worn out from this chapter. Didn't mean for it to turn out to be around 4k-5k words. XD i was going to ask yall too if u preferred faster chapter updates with shorter chapters(2k-3k) vs longer chapters(4k-5k) but with longer wait intervals. However, i ended up writing a long chapter in the end XD

And YES, it has only been 3 days surpingsly since Connor & Hank met Alina. But man has it felt like forever .~ Will this story cover a day to day basis? No, that would be too exhausting XD and the plot would be boring. But yes, I do pace things a certain way to help build up the story. Originally this chapter was gonna focus solely on the bubble bath but then it became this XD

Also feel free to go back to old chapters to see the tumblr blog posts of behind the scenes links for each of the old chapters

Our Q&A: Anything you guys are looking forward to for summer break or vacation? For me, mostly just staying at home & writing this fanfic for u guys .~


	12. Water Heater

Lets go lets go

Ayyyy

Also, once again, I tried to research so much for this, hence why it took a bit longer to update, XD and i'm not engineer, So to those tht r engineering majors, i sincerely apologize if i got anything wrong in here. Welp plz enjoy this VERY VERY long chapter tht fried my brain lol

Also thank you to our newest follows and favorited story people! Souldrifter627, izzyuchiha, bublak666

Also just wanted to say I happened to check my stats page and saw like 126 views on the latest chapter with like 44 visitors, so like (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄)⁄ like super cool like whomever is like checking out the latest chapter(ch10), like yall made me day just gotta say 3 it was nice seeing people were eager to see a new update. So I hope that this new chapter meets your expectations since it took a while to build.

* * *

Connor found that just as Wednesday had appeared and left, the same happened with Thursday. He and Alina had started the morning with another mini cooking lesson, this time with Korean Steamed Egg.

Unlike the fried eggs, which took Connor 5 times to make, Korean Steamed Egg: proved to be a bit more difficult. It took him 8 tries to make a dish good enough to earn him a thumbs up from Alina. The first three Korean Steamed Egg dishes he attempted to make, Alina instantly contorted her face even though she made efforts to hide the fact his cooking was bad.

For the rest of Thursday, Connor and Hank spent more time doing investigative work on Eris' homicide. They took the time to go to Eris' University by visiting professors, interviewing classmates, and checking out Eris' favorite campus spots to catalogue any suspicious people.

Alina was a little sad to be sitting at the DPD station majority of the day without them. She did, however, continue packing bento lunch boxes for Hank. Inside the bento lunch boxes were bite size triangle sandwiches filled with egg salad and tomatoes in between. For dessert, she packed 1 mini-square sandwich stuffed with low fat whipped cream and cut strawberries. The girl had also put into the lunch box a mini salad dressed with cherry tomatoes.

When Hank was about to throw out the salad during their lunch break, Connor threatened to show Alina video evidence of the act. It caused Hank to stand down and begrudgingly end up eating the mini salad.

For Connor, Alina had given him a thiruim packet with another sticky note. The sticky note had a '(^-^)' emoji drawn on it, alongside the words 'be careful on the job!' He felt a warm uplifting feeling in his chest upon reading the note. It was surprising how a simple gesture could make all the difference. It reminded him of the warmth he felt from Hank's hug right after the revolution. This warm feeling melted away his fatigue and weariness after having consecutive conversations with strangers.

Thursday's investigative work ended with little progress, but that night, Connor managed to talk Hank into further reducing beer consumption. Connor brought up Alina's idea about mixing water with beer to dilute Hank's alcohol intake.

Hank was reluctant to try it out, but once the older man got stared down by Alina's bright knowing smile, he reconsidered. Hank then fixed his gaze at Connor for the longest time before finally grunting out an 'Alright I'll do it."

The trio was also able to do another Detroit Gears TV session together, much like yesterday night. Connor found it peculiar that 5 minutes in Alina had gotten sleepy already, her head dipping down a couple of times before spiking up suddenly. At around the 20 minute mark, her eyes lost the battle with sleep and she drowsily landed on Hank's right shoulder just like the other days. Although overall the Detroit Gears TV session was uneventful, it was indeed as Markus said to him, 'nice to not feel left out'.

* * *

**-Friday-Dec 17th 2038-7:37am-**

Today was Connor's third cooking lesson with Alina, the focus being Onigiri. They were triangle shaped rice balls wrapped with dry seaweed. Some of them had spam hidden within the rice balls, others had chicken or beef.

As the duo waited for the cooked rice to cool down enough to be put into triangle shaped molds, Connor took the time to make a small mug of coffee for Alina. He had been a bit worried about how Alina's movements were sluggish and doing everything in a sleepy manner.

He had asked her if she was alright and needed more sleep, judging by her frequent yawns coupled with her half opened eyelids. She rubbed her messy hair, replied back claiming that she had gotten enough sleep yesterday. According to Connor's calculations she had gotten only about 7 hours of sleep. This was about 3 hours short of the recommended 10 hours of sleep for teenagers.

Connor continued to watch her with unease as she worked on bento lunch boxes with a dazed look in her eyes. It was at that moment, the coffee machine gave a 'beep' indicating that it was done making a hazelnut flavored coffee. He had figured that since she enjoyed the hot chocolate, she might enjoy this version of coffee to help her start the day. The girl had insisted in continuing to make lunch boxes despite his pleas for her to rest, so he opted in giving a small caffeine intake so she was more focused.

Alina threw Connor a small smile when he handed over the fragrant drink, warning her about its hot temperatures before she took a sip in her tired state. When she took a taste, she muttered about something along the lines of 'wanting bubble tea'.

_Bubble Tea?_

He took a moment to Google search the item and got the definition of a 'cold, frothy drink made with iced tea, sweetened milk or other flavorings, and usually with sweet black balls or "pearls" made from tapioca.' With further Google searching he found that it was a popular drink among those in the Asian community. _Perhaps I can ask Tina more about it or any bubble tea recommendations?_

Alina gulped down some more of the coffee before throwing her head back with a content sigh. She grinned at him, "Nothing like a nice warm drink in the morning."

He threw her a concerned glance, "For a 16 year old teenager, you should limit your daily intake of caffeine to 100mg or less."

Alina didn't say anything in response, just playfully hummed a tune while washing the coffee cup that she just finished drinking from.

Connor raised an eyebrow in response to how rapidly she had drowned the coffee earlier, "Don't tell me this is the amount of coffee you normally drink."

"Hm?" Alina placed the white mug onto the drying rack, her voice not as groggy as before. "Well, I normally consume some version of caffeinated drink every so often. I actually prefer tea a bit more to coffee, specifically bubble tea."

Alina took a glance at the nearby clock on the wall, perking up as she reached for the pot of rice that had been cooling down for about 15 minutes. She scooped out portions of rice into a triangle mold, pressing down one layer of rice before putting in some spam and then putting down another layer of rice. After successfully pushing out the molded triangle shaped rice ball, she wrapped it in dried seaweed with a triumphant expression.

"See?" Alina's eyes sparkled. "That's all you need to do. Put down one layer of rice into the triangle mold, choose your stuffing, and then put down another layer of rice. Press the mold together and once you think they're all tidied up, it's seaweed time!"

Connor gave her a wary look, wondering if he made the right choice in encouraging her to stay awake with a caffeine drink. He ended up shaking his head to himself as Alina eagerly worked on the next set of onigiri rice balls after her demonstration.

About 16 minutes later, Connor found himself regretting the gift of coffee he had given Alina. She was very jumpy, hopping in place and singing a mix of Japanese as well as American tunes that changed every 10 seconds all while making rice balls.

"Connor!" Alina shouted, a little too loudly to Connor's liking.

Connor took a quick glance over to Hank, letting out a sigh of relief that the older man didn't wake up from Alina's outcry.

Alina giggled some more, reaching out to his face and he stumbled back in surprise to her hand's sudden close proximity.

"I can't believe you," Alina chided with a playful tone. "You somehow got rice on your face!"

Alina plucked a grain of rice from Connor's face and laughed some more in a light-hearted manner, "How are you the most advanced android yet fail at cooking?"

Connor turned away and buried his face into his hands, not wanting Alina to see the shade of blue growing on his face from embarrassment. He knew she wasn't bullying him like Gavin and the comment was done in good nature, but he couldn't help but feel flustered from what she said.

"Awww, it's nothing to be ashamed of, Connor," Alina said softly, her footsteps growing louder as she approached Connor from the side.

Alina then gently pried Connor's hands from his face. When Connor looked up from his hands, Alina was there with her small, warm smile.

"Sorry I teased you on that," Alina let go of Connor's hands after prying them from his face. "I was just genuinely curious about that. But I think it's kinda cute at the same time."

Alina stood up on her tiptoes, stretching her arm to gently pat Connor's head despite him being slightly bent over, "Don't worry we're not all perfect and you've been doing well learning how to cook."

For a moment, Connor felt reminiscent of the times Hank had consoled him whenever he felt down. It was very similar to the feeling of a child getting comforted by their parents, like a 'pip-talk' as Hank called it. Connor straightened up his back, curiously examining Alina as she went back to work on packing the rice balls into the bento lunch boxes.

Connor thought it was strange how such a young child like her had such a mature aura. _Did she really just turn 16?_ He knew that kids in special circumstances often matured emotionally quicker, and Alina was no exception to that rule.

**[Incoming call from DPD Captain Fowler. . .]**

_**"Connor?" Captain Fowler's hoarse voice rang through Connor's internal communications.**_

_**"Good morning, Captain," Connor greeted through the phone line. "Do we have another android case to attend to?"**_

_**"Not exactly," Captain Fowler responded groggily. "We got another carbon monoxide homicide, also in a hybrid household. This time we have two casualties, human parents of an YK400 android child. The YK400 android is with Officer Pearson at the scene right now, but it might be better to have a fellow DPD android officer there too."**_

_**"Understood, I'll wake up Hank right now and we'll get to the scene as soon as possible," Connor promptly replied.**_

_**"You're a good man, Connor. Ben is also on the scene to give you additional details. I'll see you at the station later," Captain Fowler hung up, closing the line.**_

Connor let out a sigh, turning over to Alina in the kitchen, "It looks like I'll have to cut the cooking lesson short today. There's been another carbon monoxide homicide Hank and I have to attend to."

With a crestfallen expression, Alina sagged her shoulders despite all the restlessness she displayed earlier due to the coffee.

She perked up suddenly, "I'll pack Hank a grab and go breakfast then, like a toast or something."

In 5 seconds Alina was bouncing around all over the kitchen again, creating a whole new set of bento lunch boxes all while Connor was shaking Hank awake.

"Hank!" Connor called out, rustling the older man's shoulder. "We have another carbon monoxide homicide, 2 victims this time."

"What time is it?" Hank grumbled, swatting away Connor's arm. "I swear the sun is not up yet."

Connor cast an annoyed expression at Hank, pulling the blanket away from Hank's grasp. He internally groaned as this type of scenario happened every time the duo was suddenly called to an android crime scene. Connor, who preferred to get things done quickly and at a fast pace, would have to wait quite a while for Hank. The Lieutenant would move at a much slower snail-like pace when it came to moving out for crime scenes.

"It's 8:02am and the sun rose at 7:55am," Connor commented, this time also taking a pillow away from Hank's back. "So yes, the sun is now up."

Hank rubbed his eyes some more, "So what? Was it another hybrid family or something?"

"Yes, 2 human parents and a YK400 android child," Connor said as he walked into Hank's room to prepare a set of clothes.

"Was the MO the same?" Hank called back from the living room.

"Not sure, Ben will probably let us know though," Connor picked out a streaky outfit from Hank's closet and plopped it onto his bed.

"Ugh," Hank groaned out once more. "I hate mornings."

Connor returned to the living room to see that Hank was still sprawled on the couch, head hanging over the edge of the couches' arms.

"And that is why I made you some lightly roasted coffee!" Alina cheerfully came over from the kitchen with a beaming smile. "It has low fat milk and some natural sweetener instead of sugar."

Hank roughly grabbed the coffee mug from Alina's hands and took a long drink, "Don't tell me this is a bribe of sorts."

"Mayybbeee~" Alina slurred, gleefully bouncing back to the kitchen. "I have toast with sugar-free jam ready too for a grab and go breakfast."

Hank threw her a 'thanks' before going on a rant about having to get up at sunrise and made his way to the bathroom.

Connor, on the other hand, went to the kitchen and chuckled at the sight of Alina still fidgety due to the caffeine.

"Oh yeah, Alina. Would you mind letting me see your palm?" Connor asked, stretching out his left arm and revealing part of his white inner layer skin.

Alina gave him a quizzical look, furrowing her brows before resting her right hand palm side up onto top of his. Connor realized from this that he didn't specify in having her hand face down on his, so he simply turned her hand over and scanned her palm print as he initially intended to.

She initially almost jerked back at the sight of the blue glow going from her fingertips to her wrist, but quickly calmed down upon seeing that nothing really happened.

"There," Connor said, letting go of her hand. "You should now be able to have an one time access to Hank's bank account to pay for the taxi ride to the DPD later. It should be here around 9:40am."

Alina looked stunned, staring at the palm of her hand, "That's it?"

"You've never ridden a taxi before?" Connor questioned, tilting his head to the side.

Alina still looked bizarrely at her hand and turned to Connor, "No-I mean yes, but not something that requires a scanning of hand."

"Yes," Connor replied nonchalantly to her earlier question. "That is how most taxis work nowadays. You simply place your hand on the scanner and it connects to your bank account. Did your hometown not have that type of system?"

"Nope!" Alina replied excitedly, seemingly fascinated by Connor's revelation.

**[Input into Alina Niu's folder: Hometown did not have taxi system with palm scanning payment method]**

"What system did they have then?" Connor questioned, trying to see how much more information he could pry from her.

Alina lightly rested her index finger on her chin in a thoughtful manner, "It was just payment by cash or swiping a credit card. Though I usually just took public transportation."

"Like the bus?" Connor inquired further, taking a step further. Although nationwide technology had been implemented into the public transportation system, certain cities had specialized systems that could help narrow his search on her hometown.

"Yeah and the sub-" Alina flinched, pausing midway through her sentence wide eyed. "Uhh, I mean like the train system. I regularly went on that instead of taking taxis, much cheaper."

Alina began nervously trotting back to the kitchen and started packing the lunch boxes again.

**[Input into Alina Niu's folder: Hometown most likely a city, specifically one with a train system that began with the term 'sub'. Look into train terms beginning with 'sub' later. City does not have a palm scanning payment method for taxis.]**

Moments later, Hank came out of the hallway corridor dressed properly and chowed down on the breakfast placed on the kitchen table. While Hank was eating, Alina went over to Connor's side and plopped the bento lunch boxes into his hand.

"Don't worry about the rice content of the onigiri. I made sure to mix in some brown rice too in order to make it healthier for Hank," Alina whispered and gave him a wink.

"Kinda sad though that I can't play as many games with you at the DPD," Alina puffed up her cheeks and pouted. "You and Hank have to be out and about more often."

Connor chuckled at the sight and went to ruffle Alina's hair in response when he paused his hand midway in the air. _Would she like it though? Hank did though once. It should be fine, right?_ _If he suddenly retracted his hand right now, she might perceive his actions in a negative light. _

After Connor fought with his thoughts for a bit, he finally decided on going through the motion of softly tousling Alina's hair. Thankfully Alina seemed to have enjoyed the head pat, smiling brightly at the gesture. Connor let out a breath of relief that he didn't realize he was holding in. It was only after Alina joined Hank at the kitchen table that he found himself exhaling. Slowly, but surely he was going to get used to interacting with others.

* * *

Connor let out an internal sigh as they arrived at the crime scene, he had to hurry along Hank in the morning so they wouldn't keep the others waiting.

In addition, since Hank was still sleep deprived, Connor had to be the one taking the wheel to the hybrid family crime scene. They arrived at 8:48am to the one story house and found Ben greeting them once they got out of the car.

"Morning Hank," Ben addressed with a wave and turned his attention to Connor. "Nice to see you too, Connor. Always gotta thank you for bringing your old geezer over faster than normal."

"Of course," Connor chuckled. "What do we have here today?"

"911 dispatch got a call from a YK400 android child at around 7am saying her parents were unresponsive," Ben explained while walking to the sub-urban like house. "Nearby paramedics were sent and Pearson was nearby on patrol so she took a look too."

Ben pinched his nose and took in a deep breath, "Apparently the paramedics' carbon monoxide devices blared as soon as they arrived. Shortly after their arrival, Officer Pearson got to the scene and witnessed them perform CPR on the two human parents of the YK400. But it didn't work and they suspected the two had been dead for a couple hours."

"Where's Pearson right now?" Hank asked, surveying the surroundings.

Connor looked around too, finding that they were mostly surrounded by the forensics team and Pearson was nowhere to be seen.

"She's in with the YK400 aka 'Grace'. Kid's been crying in the bedroom," Ben stated. "At first we were thinking of airing out the rooms, but Pearson brought up that there seemed to be more to this case than just an accident. There were a couple of paper clips stuck in the house lock when she arrived."

Ben gestured to the front door of the house, "It had been left here clicked open, so we were thinking perhaps some foul play was involved in the carbon monoxide incident."

Ben pointed to his tablet that had some notes and pictures, "Once we checked the basement, we found that the water heater seemed to be tampered with and the ventilation system was also clogged. Similar to that last incident you two looked into where dirt was packed into the ventilation systems."

"So what, you think it's the same guy?" Hank furrowed his eyebrows and crossed his arms.

"My gut is telling me that," Ben tapped against the tablet screen. "But this time the case is a bit different, it's like they wanted to know there was an intruder there and purposefully left clues."

"You mean with the paper clips stuck inside the lock?" Connor guessed and bent down to examine the keyhole furthermore. "Wait, they only seem to be loosely fitted in. The job also seems messier than the previous incident with all the scratch marks ."

**[Analyzing. . .]**

**[1.02mm scratches-Traces of Steel]**

"You can technically take out the paper clips since they're not actually stuck," Connor noted. "It's also clicked into place so that this keyhole stays in an unlocked position. Is this what you meant?"

"It's not only that," Ben replied with a concerned look and went over to the forensics team's bag to pull out a couple of suits. "It'll be easier for me to show you inside."

"Hank, I'mma need you to put on the carbon monoxide forensics suit to go in," Ben handed over the yellow suit to Hank. "We kept the carbon monoxide contained so that Connor could take a read of the situation and spot anything new."

Connor almost burst into a fit of laughter as he got a flashback of how funny Hank looked last time from wearing the suit. Hank had looked like a yellow Patrick from the old Spongebob Squarepants cartoon. Hank must have noticed though that Connor was silently laughing because he suddenly felt chills go down his spine from a nearby glare.

Connor briskly composed himself and grunted in an attempt to cover his laugh, "It's for your own safety, Hank."

"Yeah," Hank huffed, while putting on the outer garment. "More like for your amusement."

When the trio entered the house, the first thing that Connor noticed was the carpeted living room floor that seemed to have traces of soil from the surrounding lawn. These would normally not be visible to the naked eye of humans, but for Connor he was easily able to identify them with his vision.

**[Processing . . .]**

**[Shoe Print-Men Size 10]**

**[Shoe Print-Woman Size 8]**

"There were 2 intruders," Connor said as he knelt on the ground. "One female with shoe size 8 and one male whose shoe size is 10."

"How the hell did you tell that?" Hank responded, tucking his arms in.

Connor pointed to the shoe rack by the doorway, "This family uses indoor slippers, yet there are outdoor shoe inputs on the carpet. You could say that those shoe prints belonged to the paramedics and Officer Pearson. However, the shoe print traces I'm looking at have much more soil residue and the female shoe print has a roof tile fragment."

Connor stood up and straightened his posture as he looked around for more clues, "Pearson and the paramedics have no reason to go onto the rooftop when handling a 911 call."

"God damn," Ben commented, stroking the top of his head. "I wish I had that kind of eyesight."

**[Initializing Carbon Monoxide Detector …]**

**[Living Room: 5125ppm]**

Connor took a quick scan of his surroundings as Ben talked to them about some of additional insights or theories on the case. His eyes wandered the living room walls filled with certificates from award ceremonies, until they stopped briefly at a family photo.

**[Evelyn Harper-Born 5/11/2010, Lives at 5761 Kulicks St]**

**[Matthew Harper-Born 4/09/2008, Lives at 5761 Kulicks St]**

**[Grace Harper-Activated 11/23/2037, Lives at 5761 Kulicks St]**

"Connor!" Hank's voice called to him from afar. "You coming?"

Connor quickly realized that while Ben and Hank were getting ready to enter what seemed to be the basement, while he was still stalled in the living room.

"Coming Hank!" Connor rushed over to their side and went down the stairs with them. As they entered the basement, the smell of fresh paint crashed down on him like a wave and he swiftly searched around to identify the source.

Ben showed them to a water heater currently being marked as evidence by the forensics team, it had the letters 'HF' sprayed painted on it in crimson red. Certain parts of the lettering deliberately had more concentrated spray paint to produce a drip like effect-almost to look like blood.

"We asked the little girl if she ever saw this, but apparently not," Ben said with a sigh. "It's possible that the intruders wrote it and also were the ones that tampered with this water heater to build up carbon monoxide from within the house."

Connor took a quick scan of the handwriting, seeing if it was written in a specific font type.

**[Analyzing . . .]**

**[Nonspecific Font Type; Inconsistency in Spray Writing; Written about 5 hours ago-Most likely written by Humans]**

"Our intruders for this case are most likely humans, judging by the unsteadiness in handwriting," Connor hypothesized, taking a look at the similar footprints near the water heater.

"What about deviants? Wouldn't they also have an inconsistency in handwriting now?" Hank inquired.

"Although deviants would also display human-like characteristics, I recall in my first case with Carlos Ortiz, the deviant there wrote in perfect CyberLife Sans font," Connor replied back. "Furthermore, even if they do display inconsistencies in writing as an expression of their deviancy, their spray praying skills would be a little more steady and precise compared to humans."

Ben grunted and took down some notes from Connor's observation, "So what you're saying is that you think humans did this and not any possible androids?"

"I can't be 100% sure as deviancy is still new, but as of right now my judgement is leaning towards humans," Connor contemplated out loud.

"Eh, so we got another crappy humans' crimes to take care of again," Ben's tone exasperated. "Was thinking it might be android hating on humans crime sort of thing, possibly."

Ben gave Connor a pat on the back, "Thanks for the new insight Connor. Feel free to poke around and let me know of anything new."

"Thank god this time the intruders didn't mess around with the heaters," Hank moaned as he rolled his shoulders back and started walking around the basement.

Connor took his attention straight to the water heater, finding that indeed carbon monoxide had been building up due to the flue vent being closed off. The flue vent had a warm backdraft instead of cool air being sucked in.

**[Flue Vent Pipe-recently moved by 2cm to the right]**

Since the flue vent pipe was off center, carbon monoxide exiting the water heater was leaking out more than usual.

**[Basement: 6345ppm]**

_6000 ppm?_ That meant staying here for just 10 minutes could have killed off a human due to the carbon monoxide contamination.

_Wait._ Connor paused and opened up the interior of the water heater, finding a blower fan. _This is a power vent water heater. This type of water heater was built with more safety devices to precisely prevent backdrafting of carbon monoxide, this shouldn't have caused carbon monoxide build up. Pearson was right in that this case was suspicious, what else did the intruders tamper with?_ Connor started scanning other parts of the system as well to check the safety mechanisms.

**[Gas valve recently propped open-disconnected from vacuum switch]**

**[Vacuum switch disconnected from Gas Valve; displaying incorrect blower fan read]**

"Hank!" Connor's voice echoing to the other side of the room. "I think I have an idea of what happened."

The old man waltzed over back, "So what's that analytical brain of yours got this time?"

"We're dealing with another engineer expert similar to last time," Connor pointed to the vacuum switch. "See this? This is a safety mechanism that's placed for power vent water heaters, which is specifically designed to help prevent carbon monoxide build up, compared to direct vent water heaters."

"Uh huh, go on. What's the difference between a direct venter and power vent water heater?" Hank asked as he took a closer look at the machine.

"Power vent water heaters have an extra blower or fan that propels carbon monoxide out of the water heater and into the flue pipe, which leads to outside," Connor said while pointing at the pipes. "Direct vent water heaters don't have that extra push of air to bring carbon monoxide outside. This means someone did intentionally seal up the flue pipe to cause build up."

"Continue," Hank said with intrigue, stroking his chin.

"However, the vacuum switch is supposed to be able to sense whether or not the flue pipes are clogged via monitoring the blowers," Connor said while bending down to show the mechanisms. "If the blower is too slow or not moving at all, the vacuum switch is automatically supposed to cut off access to the gas valve."

"But the gas build up still happened, meaning the gas valve was kept open somehow?" Hank added on to Connor's theory.

"Correct," Connor smiled. "The ignition sequence wasn't supposed to happen without the vacuum switch sensing the blowers. Our engineer here cut off the connection between the vacuum switch and gas valve. Then he or she sent a fake feedback loop over to the vacuum switch to keep the ignition sequence going while propping open the gas valve."

"Whew," Hank stroked the back of his head. "That's a lot of science you just told me there, son."

"There's more," Connor eagerly continued on, the thrill of piecing together everything spurred his coding even faster. "They also took measures to speed up the process of carbon monoxide build up by offsetting the flue pipe 2cm from its original location."

"These engineering bastards really thought of everything," Hank huffed. "You got all that Ben?"

"Yup, happened to get it recorded with this nifty tablet here," Ben said while walking over to their side.

Ben fidgeted around with his suit and lowered his voice, "Oh yeah, that YK400 kid is still up there. We're gonna need to have her out of here to investigate some more. Pearson's up there coaxing her, managed to calm the girl a bit-but not budging much. Is it like a deviant thing?"

Connor saw from the corner of his eye Hank's shoulder stiffen at the mention of a kid.

_Orphans, specifically, are one of Hank's trigger words or topics._ That's why Hank is hesitant to go upstairs right now, it's only been about 4 days since they encountered one child who lost their parents. _What are the odds of having to meet with another one in the same week?_

"Hank, maybe I shou-" Connor started off, but Hank is already going up the stairway back to the first floor. He felt his stomach churn at the thought of Hank having to face another orphan child case. _Will things be alright?_

* * *

Soooo, to my fellow Asians-we got ourselves a bubble tea lover. I was originally going to make her a coffee lover similar to Hank XD-also cuz its a popular college student item, but then my friend who occasionally beta reads for me was like 'mAKE HER LOVE TEA' and then I was like 'BUBBLE TEA' ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ so tht happened and she became a tea lover somehow

Also to those who checked out my tumblr blog on the behind the scenes of this story! THANK YOU for your support 3 It was nice seeing tht there were people interested in the behind the scenes of some of the chapters

Fun Fact, for the moment where Hank asked what time it is, I actually found out the exact sunrise time for Detroit Dec 17th 2038 according to the internet calculations times table :D so it is actually accurate

Q&A/Question Time!

What do you think Alina was trying to say in terms of public transportation when she said she took the 'sub-' aka train system? Might be easier for New Yorkers to figure out, especially those from NYC. Let me know what you think was the word she was trying to say, "sub- - - " Hint is that the word is only missing 3 letters and it's also a sandwich chain shop XD.

For an easier Q&A, what do you think the 'HF' written at the crime scene means? Or why do you think carbon monoxide is being chosen to kill victims?

And now-Goodbye, my brain is fried from this chapter. It was very draining in terms of research XD it will take me a couple of days to mentally recover

Thanks yall for the support! just drop a heart or a smiley face if too shy to write a review, and thks again for the person or poeple who repeatedly checked ch10 for a new update-made my dayyyyyy #


	13. I'm not crying

HELLO HELLO

Not sure if the previous chapter was as good as I thought it was, but still hoped that yall liked it

AND I'M DROPPING A HUGE BIG CHAPTER, LIKE BOMB SORT THAT LIKE FRIED MY BRAINS AND I QUESTIONED MY SANITY XD LOL

Welp bc of that, you guys might not hear from me for liek a good 3 weeks. But by then school starts T^T booooo college. So my updates will be shorter word-wise and also take longer to make. Hmmm so i guess this is sorta like the big gift chapter before i have less time to write for this story?

THANK YOU TO MY NEW FAV REVIEWER VEIRA-RAVEN FOR THE BEAUTIFUL REVIEW (•◡•) /

Also welcome to the favorite/followers fam, thank you for going with this story's ride:nixvero301, S.C. , Zorua1

* * *

Connor swallowed hard as he quickened his pace to keep up with Hank, who had already gone halfway up the basement stairs.

"Hank," Connor's voice strained as he tried to call out to the older man. However, once again it fell on deaf ears. Hank was still taking strides up the stairs in a timely manner, before stopping in front of a bedroom door.

For a moment, the two paused in front of a door with a wooden board pinned to it. It had the name 'Grace' painted in golden letters on a turquoise background and floral designs surrounding it.

Connor watched as Hank took in a deep breath and steadied himself before pushing the door open. Sitting on the wooden floor, huddled behind the bed, was Pearson and someone wrapped with a blue fluffy blanket.

When Pearson took a look at the door, relief poured into her face as she walked over to them.

"Lieutenant," Pearson's face broke into a small smile. "I managed to calm Grace down for the most part, but it's been difficult getting her actually out of the house."

Pearson scratched the bottom of her cheek, "She had been screaming earlier for her parents...but you know that forensics already took them. I've tried kid thirium packets, passed her a stuffed animal and wrapped her up in a blanket to comfort her."

Pearson heaved out a sigh, adjusting the cap on her head, "It has helped calmed her to some degree, but not enough to move her out of the crime scene."

She turned to Connor, "Is she going to Jericho after this or you think other relatives will take her in?"

Connor shook his head, "We'll have to go to the station first to see if any family would be willing to take her in; hybrid family laws are still a bit shaky in the Department of Social Services." He turned to his left as Hank slowly approached the little bundled up figure.

Hank knelt down to the girl's level and then sat down next to her, "My name's Hank, I'm with the Detroit Police."

A little girl peeped her head out of the blue blanket in response. She had fair, beige skin, soft blonde hair and blue jewel-like eyes glistening with tears. The YK400 girl, predecessor to the YK500, was made to replicate the appearance of a 6-8 year old.

Connor adjusted the cuffs to his suit, taking a nervous glance at Hank who had a grim expression. _Would her appearance remind Hank of little Cole?_

Even though the little girl was wrapped underneath a blanket, Connor could see that her figure was still visibly shaking.

**[YK400-'Grace'-Stress Levels 78%]**

Hank grunted, fixed his sweater a bit before talking again with a gentle demeanor, "What's your name?"

"Grace," she mumbled out, her voice barely audible. She took a brief look up at Hank before looking back down at the carpeted floor.

The blanket fell from her head, sliding down to her shoulders. It revealed a girl with a violet polka-dotted purple pajama set. In her hand was a teddy bear that she held tightly to her chest.

For a second, Connor's mind flashed back to the time he first met Alina. On that fateful night, Alina was clutching a Dva doll to her body when he had attempted to approach her. However, compared to the child right in front of them, Alina was much more calm and reserved, which made it easier for her to trust them.

Connor rummaged through his databases and the internet on the best ways to approach children around the age of 6. Despite the negotiator and social programming codes he was packed with, he still felt like he was lacking in terms of socially connecting with people. When he became a deviant, all he managed to do was acknowledge and bring those feelings up to the surface.

_What would be the best course of action here?_

Hank, on the other hand, picked up a nearby rabbit plushie situated on the girl's bed. He coughed a bit and adjusted his voice to a scratchy higher-pitched tone than normal.

"Hello Grace!" Hank had the little bunny plushie hop in place as he narrated from the stuffed animal.

The girl looked up again a second time, toyed with a lock of hair and propped up her teddy bear onto the carpeted ground.

"Hi," she said, making her teddy bear wave back at the rabbit across from her.

Hank had the stuffed rabbit take a step forward, "How are you feeling?"

Grace had the teddy bear cover its eyes with its paws and shake its head from side to side, "I'm feeling sad. My mommy and daddy are gone."

For a split second, Connor swore he heard Hank click his tongue.

Hank's breath hitched for a moment and he spoke again in a higher-pitched voice, "The Detroit Police can help you feel a bit better."

Grace raised her chin, speculation written all over her face, "How?"

Hank had the rabbit jump around excitedly around the teddy bear, "The police have lots of fun games to play and a big TV to watch stuff."

Grace's hold on the teddy bear slackened, almost letting its face hit the ground as she contemplated.

"They also make pain fly away so you don't feel as sad," Hank coughed and stroked his throat, most likely in an effort to reduce the strain of talking in a higher pitch.

"Like swoosh and boom!" Hank made the rabbit jump and twirl around. "And you feel lighter and sadness goes away. Just like all the bad guys the police put away."

The teddy bear didn't respond at first, but limped forward and tapped the rabbit's ears with its paws.

"Will they find the bad guys that hurt mommy and daddy?" Grace contorted her face, her shoulders slouching downward .

Hank had the little rabbit walk back to where he was sitting, "Good day Mister Police Officer!"

"Hello there, what can I do for you?" Hank replied back to the bunny, switching to his normal voice, instead of the squeaky one that narrated the bunny during the entire conversation.

"I have a good friend here." The bunny paused, then turned to Grace. "Can I call you my friend?"

Grace nodded back a 'yes', her blanket falling to the ground in the process.

"Mister Officer, my good friend needs someone to help her catch some bad guys," Hank squeaked out and had the bunny notion to Grace. "Can you do that?"

"Of course I can find them for your friend over there," Hank switched back to his gruff voice. "But can you do me a favor and help me ask a question to your friend?"

Hank pretended to whisper into the rabbit's ears while keeping his voice loud and clear.

"You see, I'm a bit nervous to ask the pretty girl over there if she wants to be my partner in fighting crime today. Like a junior detective of sorts you know?"

Hank had the rabbit hop to the teddy bear, "Can you ask Grace if she would like to be a junior detective?"

The teddy bear nodded and saluted back, "Grace, Mister Officer wants to know if you would like to be a junior detective?"

At first Grace didn't reply and there were a couple moments of uncomfortable silence, but Hank seemed to be patient in waiting for a response.

On Connor's end, it was a bit unusual seeing Hank so stoic-like and displaying a calm demeanor. He was very used to seeing Hank's intolerance for day to day tasks, it was different. . .seeing Hank like this.

Finally, after what seemed like ages of silence from Grace's end, she too whispered into her stuffed plush's ears.

The teddy bear stood up and walked over to the rabbit, "Grace says she would like to help catch bad guys." It then rubbed its hands nervously. "But she doesn't know if police people will like androids. Mommy and Daddy were nice, but not everyone like that."

Hank gestured over to Connor, "You see him over him?"

Grace's gaze went over to Connor and he jumped up from his sudden introduction to the conversation. He gave her a small smile and waved, silently hoping it didn't look too awkward.

"That's my son, Connor," Hank was grinning from ear to ear. "He's an android just like you, and he's a detective on the police force."

Connor's eyes widened at Hank's proud declaration and he felt his cheeks heat up a bit.

"He's an official detective in the Detroit Police and my partner. They treat him pretty well, so I think they'll like you too," Hank declared and stretched out his arm for a handshake. "So what do you say? Want to be my junior detective for the day?"

Grace hesitantly reached out to Hank's hand, but once she took it Connor could see tiny crinkles forming on her face and her muscles relax. Hank heaved himself up while still holding the young girl's hand.

"Why don't you introduce yourself, Connor?" Hank said, still holding onto the rabbit with his other hand.

Connor knelt down on one knee and extended his hand to Grace, "It's nice to meet you, Grace. My name's Connor." Next, his brain scrambled on what else to say as Hank had already told the little girl his occupation.

"I work with the Detroit Police, but I also help out Markus with Jericho on occasion," Connor watched as Grace's eyes brightened up at the mention of the Jericho leader. It was a good idea to bring up his connection with someone reputable, most likely helped bring up his level of trust to the YK400.

Compared to her earlier hesitance, Grace gently took Connor's hand and shook it with a little more enthusiasm.

"I look forward to working with you," Connor said back courteously.

They were able to get out of the house without a hassle and it was only outside did Connor realize Pearson had already left the house during Hank's conversation with Grace.

While Hank was stripping himself of the forensics carbon monoxide suit, Pearson came running up to Connor. She was back in her regular police uniform too.

"You guys did it!" Pearson grinned as she walked over to Connor's spot. Together they observed Hank interacting with the YK400 after pulling off the mini oxygen tank.

Hank wore a tender look while softly speaking to Grace, "You ready for an adventure, Grace? We can play 'I spy with my little eye' on our way to the station."

Pearson whispered over to Connor, "That's something you don't see everyday."

"I think she reminds him of Cole."

_Ah._ Connor flinched, surprised by his own slip of the tongue. _It was true though, that the YK400's 6-year-old like appearance might have triggered something._

Pearson's expression softened as well, "Yeah, she probably does."

"Welp, good luck at the station and having to make a bunch of phone calls to relatives," Pearson gave Connor a pat on the back before taking her leave.

_Hmmm, I'll have to contact Markus about Grace. In this type of situation, since the child is a YK400, would human relatives take precedent over Jericho? Would it be better for Grace to be with human relatives or with her own kind?_

Connor looked up to see Hank hand in hand with Grace, going into their car. _Markus will probably have to adjust hybrid family policies from this._

* * *

Alina cocked her head to the right in curiosity when she saw Hank and Connor walk into the DPD with a little girl. She thought it was also peculiar that Hank had a grim expression on his face, but as soon as the little girl looked over he would change into a bright smile. But regardless of the smile, there seemed to be an air of heaviness around him.

If it wasn't for all the years she worked in customer service, she might have been fooled by it too. She knew too well about giving forced business smiles and got used to identifying them. Her coworkers had often remarked how easily she switched from normal to business mode.

Alina threw Connor a concerned look and when the two's eyes locked, she gestured over to Hank. _What's going on with Hank?_ Connor seemed to have understood her intentions and mouthed 'I'll tell you later.'

Other DPD members also had intrigued looks when they saw Hank walking hand in hand with what looked to be a girl around 6 or 7 years old. There were whispers going around as Hank approached Alina and Tina's desk. Well, technically it was Tina and Gavin's desk, but since Alina was with them a lot, it unofficially became her place too. Gavin had already left for another case so it was just the two of them.

"Hello," Alina flashed a bright but slightly tentative smile to the little girl. In turn, the little girl took a step back and hid behind Hank's leg.

Alina got up from her chair, knelt to the ground and sat down on her knees. From her prior experience as a daycare and summer camp worker, she knew it was better to approach children from their level. Just by standing normally, adults could unintentionally frighten kids due to their towering height difference.

"My name's Alina," Alina continued talking in a soothing voice, sympathetic to the fact that perhaps the girl was wary of strangers. "What's yours?"

"Grace," the little girl squeaked out, her arms clinging to Hank's leg.

"Hi Grace, it's nice to meet you," Alina put her right palm up. "Is it alright if I can get a high five?"

Grace gave a brief look to Hank and he gave her a nodded approval. With that, she took the initiative in giving Alina a high five.

"Wow, look at you," Alina's corners of her mouth broadened into a brighter grin. "That was such an amazing high five!"

Alina let out a sigh of relief when she saw Grace loosen her hold on Hank and beamed while saying 'Thank you!'

The apprehensiveness that Grace had displayed earlier disappeared as she walked up from behind Hank, arms tucked behind her. Instead, she seemed to be studying Alina with piqued interest.

Hank turned to the other three present, "Connor, Imma need you to look after Grace over here while I talk with Jeffrey about this whole thing."

Hank pulled over a chair for Grace before he looked over to Tina, "Can I count on you too? Grace just lost her parents due to the carbon monoxide incident call in the morning. This is a bit of a new field Connor's venturing in that he'll need help with."

"Of course." Tina gave a mini salute to Hank, understanding the Lieutenant's implications. Then, she started introducing herself to Grace and kicked off a conversation between them.

Alina tuned out of their exchange to stare at Hank's lumbering figure as the man entered Captain Fowler's office. Occasionally some words would filter through and she would get bits and pieces of their talk. She heard some words such as 'YK400', 'android' and 'oh that's why you don't want to eat'.

It took Alina a moment to put everything together and process that Grace was a YK400 model. Tina had offered a drink or snack without knowing that Grace technically couldn't process food.

_A YK400, was there such a model in the game?_ Alice was a YK500 and supposed to resemble a 10-year-old if she remembered correctly. _I'm guessing a YK400 is supposed to resemble a 6 to 8-year-old?_

Alina turned her attention back to Hank in Captain Fowler's office. There seemed to be hushed whispers between the two, but Hank obviously seemed frustrated. He was clenching his fists and baring his teeth in between his sporadic spoken words.

"Hey."

She looked over to her left, seeing Connor leaning on Gavin's desk and using it as support.

Alina arched an eyebrow, "Should you really be doing that when he hates you with his guts?"

Connor shrugged, "Think of it as payback for all those insults he throws at me daily. It's not like I'm breaking DPD property either."

"So what's up with Hank?" She cocked her head over to the glass office.

Connor sucked in his breath, "It's just a hypothesis. But I think Grace reminded him of Cole, his 6-year-old son."

Connor adjusted his position, rubbing his hands together. "Little Cole was 6 years old when he and Hank got in a car accident. A truck skidded on a sheet of ice and caused Hank's car to roll over. Cole needed emergency surgery, but the human surgeon at the hospital was high on red ice. H-He didn't make it, even with the assistance of an android."

As Connor was retelling the story, Alina's mind was playing back the same dialogue she had heard countless times on her playthroughs. There were small differences between what Connor had said in-game and now, but the important details were generally the same.

It was kinda interesting how Connor evolved even more so with his deviancy, causing slight word changes such as 'little Cole' or the stuttering. Machine Connor wouldn't have necessarily done that.

Connor leaned forward a bit, clasping his hands together, "I think there's also another reason why he's in such a state. It pertains to how he treats you and Grace...You're both orphans and had the opposite of the accident occurred, Cole would ha-"

"Hm?"

_Why did he pause?_ She traced Connor's line of sight to Hank, who had just finished conversing with Captain Fowler. _Ahhh, that makes sense._

Hank came out of the office, stroking his nape. He narrowed his eyes upon seeing that Connor and Alina were staring at him. The fact that Connor's mouth was a bit agape only seemed to heighten Hank's suspiciousness over their slightly unusual behavior.

"What?" Hank continued frowning and raised his eyebrows. "You two look like you've been caught talking shit or something."

They didn't reply, only stealing a glance at each other on what to say back with the awkward atmosphere.

Finally, Connor filled in the gap, stuttering within his words, "Um, we were talking about the next steps in Grace's case."

"Ahh, yes. We'll have to make a bunch of phone calls," Hank said, his eyebrows still raised as if he wasn't convinced with Connor's excuse. "I checked in with Jeffrey and apparently the human relatives in hybrid families get first dibs on android kids before Jericho."

Hank turned to Grace, who was playing a hockey app game with Tina on the tablet Alina had lent.

"Grace, is there anyone specific you would like to go to?"

Grace suddenly paused, her shoulders drooped down and her expression became dark.

"Mommy and daddy's families don't like androids, they don't think of me as part of their families."

"Tsk," Hank ran his hands through his hair. Alina could hear him swearing underneath his breath.

Alina went to give Grace a comforting pat on the shoulder, but stopped midway. She wasn't sure how Grace would feel to have a stranger patting them. Luckily, Tina took the lead in trying to soothe the child with some comforting words.

"Alright," Hank huffed out. "According to procedure, I still have to reach out to relatives and let social services into the loop. Connor and I will check out the relative contact list and call them one by one."

Hank squatted down so that he was eye level with Grace, "Don't you worry kid, the Detroit Police are gonna help you find a home. If anything, Jericho will welcome you with open arms. Connor's friends with Markus and he'll make sure you fit right in. How do you like that plan?"

Grace nodded solemnly but didn't seem convinced. She stared at the bunny and teddy bear in her hands and didn't look up at Hank afterwards. Tina tried to appease her some more with comforting words in a hushed tone, but Grace didn't respond.

While Hank and Connor made the calls to human relatives, Alina helped keep Grace preoccupied with all the games she had downloaded into her tablet. When that got too repetitive, Alina offered to let Grace braid her hair if the little girl was interested. Luckily, it seemed to have improved Grace's mood as she perked up instantly at Alina's suggestion.

Grace first played around with Alina's long hair, forming some small braids and then eventually evolved into larger braids that spanned across her head. During the process, Alina took small peeks over to Hank and Connor's desk to see how they were doing.

Connor, who was talking with someone via internal communication, looked like he was on mute. He wasn't physically producing any sounds, yet his mouth was still moving and he was doing several body gestures throughout his conversations.

_I guess that's one of the perks of being an android. You get to have internal conversations with people 24/7. And in turn, a sort of android telepathy...mannn that would be awesome to have as humans._

When Alina turned to Hank, she noticed that he was looking more stressed with each passing phone call, face contorting every time he ended one.

_I wonder if I can help cheer him up later?_

It had been about an hourish into calling and Alina noticed the two men visibly worn out. Hank was slouched over, rubbing his eyes. In Connor's case, he was staring into space occasionally and his movements seemed slower than before.

While staying still for Grace's braiding session, Alina overheard Hank groaning to Connor saying that some of the relatives didn't even know that Grace was in their family tree. Apparently, Grace's parents didn't tell family members that they had a daughter.

In hindsight, it might have been the best decision though considering the revolution and weariness of humans to androids. After all, it had been a month since the American people's unrest due to the android revolution.

Hank let out a sigh, his splayed fingers covering his face, "Any luck on your end?"

Connor shook his head, "No, unfortunately."

The older man got up, headed down the hallway to the restrooms, "I need a breather."

Connor noticed Grace's wandering eyes on him and tried to reassure the young girl.

"Don't worry, I'll have a talk with Markus right now and arrange things with Jericho's Social Services Department. We'll make sure you're somewhere safe tonight."

Connor then got up and left to presumably talk to the android leader in private.

Alina looked back at Grace, whose lips were starting to tremble and eyes began to well up with tears. She rapidly spoke up to try to wash away Grace's doubts and fears.

"Don't worry, Jericho has lots of other kids there and great caretakers."

When those words seemed to have no impact, Alina then went to search up children's ebooks on the internet, hoping that reading a book might brighten up Grace's mood. She ended up randomly picking up an ebook called 'Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!' It had several good written reviews and was rated 4.5/5 stars.

"Oh, nice choice!"

Alina looked back to see Tina peering over Alina's shoulder.

"Why don't we try reading a book together? That might make you feel better," Tina piped in.

However, as soon as Alina opened up to the first page of the book, Grace began sniffling. These small sniffles rapidly evolved into a crying session with tears spilling down the little girl's cheeks. Alina instantly put down the tablet and tried consoling her to the best of her ability.

Grace started tightly grasping her bunny and teddy bear plushies to her body as her tears stained the pajama shirt. The stuffed animals that were trapped in Grace's grasp were not spared either from the tears dripping downward.

Anything Tina and Alina tried to say to alleviate Grace's cries were in vain, as the tiny girl simply shook her head back and forth in a 'no' motion, seemingly in defiance of something. Her wailing soon became loud enough that it echoed in the DPD Main Chamber.

Some passing officers also on duty came to Tina's desk to help out the two with Grace, using soft voices to speak to the child. However, Grace's crying tantrum became louder with the added attention from strangers to the scene.

Tina eventually cleared away the other officers that came to help and any other curious spectators. It became clear that having multiple people near Grace, even if they were trying to assist, made the situation worse.

At one point, Grace became verbally unresponsive to any words spoken to her, only reacting by hugging her stuffed animals and curling herself up in a pretzel-like shape. In between her uncontrollable sobbing, she would occasionally hiccup.

Alina's mind was racing on what to do. The fact that Hank and Connor weren't there to help only made her heart beat even more anxiously. _Where are they? How many minutes has it been? And out of all the times the Captain is out of his office._

Sure, her past jobs as a daycare and summer camp counselor helped initially with bonding with Grace and keeping her calm for the most part. But none of her past experiences' mechanisms on calming down children seemed to be working at the moment. Grace had knocked away thirium packets, coloring books, and anything said appeared to go in one ear and out the other.

Alina picked away at the skin near her fingertips, trying to comb through past memories. _This is why I switched to a grocery store cashier job as soon as I could. _It wasn't that she didn't like kids, but rather it became exhausting to deal with situations like this daily as a daycare worker.

It was a fairly common occurrence for daycare kids to be crying for their parents. She especially disliked parents that just coldly dropped off their children without batting an eye as their kids screamed in anguish calling for mom or dad.

She had gotten used to it to some degree, but it didn't make her job any easier. Her stomach would always knot up whenever parents dropped off kids at daycare. Nonetheless, daycare and camp counselor jobs were the easiest to come by as a teenager.

Alina then tried recalling what her parents would do when she was crying as a young kid. She knew that she didn't often cry as a child, giving her few reference points. Very vaguely she recalled her father giving her a sweet drink whenever she felt bad from a fight with friends or got a lower than expected test grade. If it was the winter, her dad would give her hot cocoa. If it was the summer, it would be smoothies.

Mum would sing to Alina while stroking her hair until she calmed down. Sometimes if it was a particularly bad day, Mum would bake mini-cupcakes and they would decorate them together.

All of those possible solutions were thrown out of the door though in this situation. Grace doesn't need to eat anything other than thirium and it wasn't like they had baking materials either.

She rummaged through her mind some more, until one particular memory decided to resurface despite having been buried years ago.

_It was a couple of months after successfully pushing for a divorce with dad._

_One night there were powerful thunderstorms, accompanied by powerful winds that crashed nearby power lines and caused a power outage in the neighborhood._

_12-year-old Alina was stuck alone in a . . ._

_dark,_

_empty_

_house._

_At that time, she had nothing but her trusty tablet illuminating her path in the dark. She had been playing with it prior to the blackout and it was one of the few working portable electronic devices in the house. _

_After the power had gone out, she sat herself down in the middle of the hallway away from the blazing flashes of lightning that battered the living room and bedrooms. While sitting down on the hardwood floor, she maxed out the tablet's brightness to have some sort of constant light presence in the suffocating darkness._

"_I'm a big girl, I'm a big girl now," Alina told herself repeatedly. She beat her own chest with her bare hands in an effort to drown out the sounds of her heartbeat. They had been desperately pounding loudly in her brain amidst the muckiness and fear turmoiling inside her once the lights had blacked out._

_When that didn't work, she tried puffing out her chest to make it feel like she wasn't being swallowed up by the shadows that danced across her walls. Despite that, her eyes fluttered a bit as tears threatened to spill from her eyes._

_Her bottom lip quivered in the dark, but she sucked in her breath to calm herself as she picked up her cell phone to call her mother._

_Thunder crackled in the background, and she let out a yelp when she almost dropped her phone midcall. The walls shuddered in response to the howling winds from outside and from the corner of her eyes she could see the trees viciously sway at the mercy of mother nature._

"_This call has been forwarded to an automated voice mail system. 646,112,2030."_

_Alina pulled her knees close to herself, placing the tablet on her lap and tried calling again._

"_This call has been forwarded to an automated voice mail system. 646,112,20-"_

_And again._

"_This call has been forwarded to an automated voice mail system. 646,112-"_

_And again._

"_This call has been forwarded to an automated voice mail system. 646-"_

_And again._

"_This call has been forwarded to an auto-"_

'_**Beep'**_

_Finally, she closed the cell phone and let her hand slide down to the ground along with the electronic device in hand. Another flash of lightning bared itself onto the house walls and Alina's body winced as she braced for the onslaught of sound that came after._

_**BOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMM**_

_She cowled in fear for who knew how long and her body trembled as the storm continued through the night. By now, hot tears had raced down her cheeks and she involuntarily let out a whimper as she came to the conclusion that no one was coming to help her here. _

_She ended up crying for what felt like hours, sniffling as she worked to clear her blurry vision. It ended up backfiring as clearing her vision only made it easier to see the raging storm outside and the echoing hollowness inside the house._

'_Maybe if I never pushed dad out, this wouldn't have happened,' She thought. 'Maybe I wouldn't have to be here alone.' Tremors overtook her as her brain was ransacked with 'What Ifs' that could have happened to avoid this predicament. Then in the middle of her mind's ramblings, she heard the front door shake terribly and she shrunk in anticipation of the next catastrophe to come._

_Only it wasn't the storm, it was her mother wrangling the door open with keys dripping with water._

_Mum's hair was all frazzled, locks of hair were tangled with her shoulder strap, clothes were drenched from the rain, and color was drained from her face. Mum ran over to Alina in the hallway, cupping Alina's small delicate face before giving her a hug._

_She vaguely recalled her mum saying some words but they were overtaken by the fact that her mum had spoken them while taking shallow rapid breaths._

_One thing Alina did remember was her mum saying, "Hey honey. Don't worry, mama's gonna get the power back on." Her mother brushed away a piece of Alina's hair before trying out some power switches in the house._

_That day was definitely one of the more defining moments of her childhood. She remembered feeling incredibly guilty. While she sat on the ground crying and trying to compose herself, her mother took charge of bringing everything back to normal. Her mother did so much in financially supporting their household of two, but all she could do was cry about how scared she was at home during the storm._

_Because of all that crying, her eyes became red and swollen for a couple of hours. That night she simply laid herself into her mother's arms and hugged away the terror that flooded her mind earlier. It took an entire night of comforting to fully calm herself down._

_Ever since that day, she tried her best to overcome her fear of being alone in the house. Mum looked so overworked that day with the eye bags and tired creases on her forehead , in addition to being wrecked from the rainstorm. Part of her vowed that she'll do whatever it took to stand on her own two feet so that she wouldn't have to worry Mum like that night. _

_The other part of her cherished that night with her mother. Within minutes of her mother's arrival, just from a small hug, she was able to feel safe and secure. As the years passed, their relationship grew strained due to her mum's absence from the house. However, Alina lips still perked up when she fondly recalled the tiny moments that had mother had been there for her, such as that fateful night back in 2013._

'_Mum, thanks for that night,' She thought to herself. 'I guess I still kinda miss you.'_

"Why do you miss your mom?"

_Wait, what?_

Alina blinked out of her trance-like state to see Grace staring deeply at her with wide eyes.

"Did you lose your mom too?"

_Wait, did I say that out loud?_ Alina let out a small gasp and quickly covered up her mouth at the realization. She looked to the side, seeing Tina give her a concerned look as well. _Ahhh, shoot. How did this end up about me? I was supposed to comfort Grace._

"Uhhh, yeah," Alina eventually replied back awkwardly. She clasped her hands together and rubbed them nervously. "I lost my parents a couple of days ago too. Just like you, so I know how scary it feels."

Grace hung her head downward, swinging her legs back and forth a bit, "I'm sorry."

"Why are you apologizing?" Alina raised an eyebrow, confused at Grace's change of behavior.

"You lost your mommy and daddy too, but you're not crying," Grace mumbled out. "I just keep crying and I don't know why I can't stop."

Alina took in a deep breath, trying to formulate her next set of words, "I don't think crying is bad. In this case, crying means that you care about your parents. It means you love them and you miss them."

Grace looked back up, still pouting, "How did you stop crying?"

"I-I stopped thinking about them," Alina fumbled with her sweater while maintaining eye contact with Grace. "Because thinking about them hurts. So I stopped thinking about them to stop hurting."

It wasn't necessarily the truth, but it wasn't necessarily a lie either. Back when she was 12, still scared of being alone in the house, she would sometimes cry herself to sleep when her mum would come home late. Alina would ask her mum to come home a bit earlier on the days she had to be alone. For the first couple of months after the divorce, her mother would attempt to fulfill her request; however, for financial reasons it later became an impossible task.

To do this, Alina mentally trained herself in several ways.

She stopped relying on the idea that her mother would always be able to keep her company at home.

She stopped expecting her mother to be at home at all, even more so for her father.

It was easier that way: to stop expecting help or support from her mother so that she'll never have to feel disappointed from a potentially broken promise. _That's probably why we started doing less and less recreational activities together too._

"But I don't wanna stop thinking about them, I don't wanna forget mommy and daddy," Grace cried out.

"And you don't have to," Alina replied. "Everyone feels hurt in different ways, which means they can also heal or feel better in different ways."

Grace's shoulders sagged as she started sniffling again, "I don't think I can ever feel better."

Alina decided to kneel down on one knee so that she could be at eye-level with Grace.

"Grace, I need you to look at me carefully," Alina pleaded as Grace's cries started to grow in volume. "Just for a little bit, okay? Just for one second."

'_When asking for something from kids, start from something small so it's not that daunting.'_ Alina faintly recalled her daycare manager saying. _Perfect timing, Teach._

True to her manager's advice, Grace nodded in agreement to Alina's suggestion and briefly quieted down.

"Thank you for being such a big, brave girl by doing that," Alina gently put aside one of Grace's curls and dabbed Grace's tears with a napkin. Tina handed Alina some more tissues over from the side, careful not to disturb the delicate atmosphere Alina created.

"I know right now it can be scary because your mommy and daddy are gone. And it feels like all you can do is cry right now. But things are going to get better," Alina said. "It's going to take time. You'll cry for a bit more, but you'll heal one day and feel better."

"How do you know?"

"Because I got through it too," Alina continued wiping Grace's tears. "Because the Grace I know, tried her very best to stop crying and feel better. The Grace I know, did a beautiful job braiding my hair to distract herself. I know that out of everyone here, you are doing your best and your efforts will pay off."

"You promise I'll feel better?"

Alina playfully tapped Grace's nose, "I promise."

Grace giggled in response and the room's mood almost immediately lightened up.

"That's better," Alina whispered. "You have such a pretty smile, the world doesn't deserve to lose such a smile."

"Alright, I'll teach you a little trick I just thought of," Alina took a deep breath and slapped her thighs as she sat back in her chair. "If you're ever feeling down, just smile. Even if you don't feel like it, just smile. That heavy, _heavy_ feeling in you goes away and it feels like a flower is blooming in your chest."

"Really?" Grace eagerly asked.

"Try it right now."

Grace put her hands on her cheeks and pulled them apart to form a smile. Before long, she's smiling for real and doesn't need the support from her hands.

"It worked!" Grace excitedly cheered, jumping up from her seat and hugging Alina.

Alina froze at the sudden gesture, but returned the hug. _Thank god that worked._

"Yes, you did! Good job!" Alina exhaled a huge sigh of relief. She felt completely worn out and they were only halfway through the day. _This is why I stopped working with kids. It's like a roller coaster emotion ride. Though it was understandable with Grace's scenario. I just hope she doesn't get too attached to me since she's going to Jericho._

Tina threw Alina a thumbs-up sign while she was still hugging Grace.

"You're a natural," Tina mouthed.

_No, I'm not. Please don't think that, I don't think I'm mentally prepared to help some more._

* * *

Alina inwardly groaned as her fear came true. It was now the end of Hank and Connor's workday. They were prepared to drop off Grace at Jericho, but it appeared that Grace grew a little too fond of Alina to the point that the little girl was reluctant to go to Jericho.

However, according to Connor, Jericho now had an ID system to get in. For most humans that wished to gain access to Jericho, there was a 2-3 week security background check and processing period to gain an ID. Of course, having never gone to Jericho before, Alina didn't have one. The best that she could do was wave goodbye by the car that was parked near Jericho's entrance.

"How about this?" Alina reasoned. "I'll try to get a Jericho ID as soon as possible, just so I can visit you. Alright?"

"Okay," Grace relented at last, taking Connor's hand and walking into the Jericho facility. She continued waving goodbye to Alina till they were out of view.

Alina let out a huff as she pulled open the car's backseat door, exhaustion taking over her body as soon as she sat down. She could finally relax and let her guard down a bit. Kids could be extremely perceptive of emotions and she didn't want to make Grace feel unwanted in the DPD station so she constantly wore a smile for the majority of the day.

Comforting a kid was a lot of work and wore her down considerably. _How did mom do it?_ _Ahhh, that's right. She didn't have to do it much since I tried my best to not burden her._ Though, on that night of the thunderstorm with power outage, her mom did panic a lot from the multiple missed calls from her. Apparently, her mother thought there might have been a break-in or something.

_Does mum miss me? How long have I been missing from the real world? Does time work the same?_

_Ahh, I'm stupid. Of course she probably does, anyone with a sane mind would panic over a missing daughter. Mum was a single mother divorcee, and now her only child disappeared. What was I thinking? Not frantically looking for a way back._

Alina swallowed guiltily at the thought of her mother filing a missing person's report. She had gotten too used to being in the Detroit Become Human world, enjoying her time here while her mother was probably worried to no end.

Alina crinkled her nose and clasped her hands over her head. All she wanted was not having to worry about her real-life problems, and the Detroit Become Human game was her escape. And it _literally_ did. But just because she did that for herself didn't mean it didn't affect those in her surroundings. How could she forget that?

Alina slapped herself in the face, knowing full well that she didn't. She just _**didn't want to think about it. **__Ugh, I'm such an idiot._

"Something up?"

Alina jumped up in surprise to see that Hank and Connor were back so quick in the front seats. Hank wore a tired but worried expression as he looked back at her.

"Um, this is a weird request," Alina fidgeted in her seat. "But would it be alright if we could visit the spot where you guys found me? I want to see if I can find any clues on how I got here."

Hank revved up the car, "Sure, we could have gone earlier in the week too if you wanted."

Alina grunted in reply, not knowing what else to say on the way there. Connor was also awfully quiet too, which concerned her. But she didn't know how to bring about the topic with all the tension in the air. All she knew was that once Connor dropped off Grace at Jericho, he seemed more stoic than usual as if he was holding back something.

"Dubois St and East Canfield Street's interaction," Hank said once they got to their destination.

Alina got out of the car first, followed by Connor and Hank.

"Did you see anything unusual that day, perhaps?" Alina asked as she tried to look for any signs of multi-dimensional traveling.

"Nope, only thing was probably the fucking snowstorm. Though that's normal here in Detroit," Hank said, leaning against his car. "What about you, kid? Remember anything from that day?"

Alina put up her hand against the air, seeing if there was an invisible door maybe somewhere.

"Only thing I remember was opening a door. There was some blinding light, next thing I knew I was outside," Alina replied.

Alina walked over to Connor, "This is a bit of a weirder request but do you have like x-ray or like light-spectrum vision. Basically see stuff that you can't see with the naked eye."

Connor blinked at her, puzzled, "Yes, on different light spectrums. But I don't think it'll be much help."

"Please? Can you just try them out?" Alina put her hands up together, pleading.

"Okay, but I'm not sure if it'll show any results," Connor said as he took off scanning.

They ended up staying there for about 20 minutes with Connor's scans not picking up anything. Alina's search for some sort of visible door also ended up in vain, so part of her gave up on trying some more.

_I hope you are doing well, mum._

Just as Alina gave up and walked back to the car, Hank came up to her and blocked her way.

"You know, you can cry too," Hank suggested. "Just like you said to Grace apparently. It's fine to let it out. Me and Con are here for you."

"It's fine," Alina put up a tight-lipped smile. "I don't need to cry, I'm good."

She moved to walk around Hank, but was stopped short by him again.

"You mean, you don't want to?"

Alina paused, trying to think of what to say. As far as she was concerned from her past experiences, she didn't need to cry. Crying did nothing to change the situation, it wasn't like her mother would come rushing back home every time it happened. It wouldn't do the family any good either. This situation wasn't any different, just accept the reality of things and move on.

"No, I don't need to," Alina said again, with an unwavering expression.

Hank stared back at her, not saying anything. For a moment, they were at a standstill and she found it frustrating that she couldn't understand the puzzling expression on his face. After a couple moments of silence, Hank stepped to the side, letting her through and gave her a pat on the back.

"Let's go back, kiddo."

And let's just say the car ride back with the three of them was…mostly just radio music filling in the awkward gaps of silence.

* * *

OKAYYYY HELLLO EVERYONE IM MENTALLY DEAD. I think i surpassed my last limit of 7500, bc this word count is telling me about 8000 words. Ummm, yeah, yall aint gonna hear from me for a while XD i think i'm burned out. Compared to my usual 5k words

Biggest hurls for this chapter: definitely the flashback bc i wanted to immerse readers into tht setting. The crying scenes btw young Alina and also Grace crying. Grace was difficult to formulate in the sense that we have a YK400 tht is supposed to be like a 6 year old, but has the knowledge of an android. So balancing how Grace would ultimately talk, was something tht took a while. Had to do research on how to calm 6 year olds XD hopefully i got tht down

Trivia: The phone number 646-112-2030. SO this was inspired by how Bryan created Connor's serial number("Bryan Dechart came up with the serial number on Connor's jacket, 313 248 317-51. He explained in a Twitch stream that 313 stands for the Detroit area code, 248 for his home area code, 317 for his birthday, 5 for the number of people in his family, and 1 standing for the first Connor.")

SO in this case 646 is standard nyc, 11220 is a reference to the zip code in nyc from where Alina is from. 3 is the # of people in her family. 0 represents how she is in a new world and starting from scratch in a sense.

So my only Q&A, which i wasn't going to do initially bc i wrote 20 pages of storywriting on google docs and brain is fried, is if you guys could figure out which part of nyc 11220 the zip code is referencing to? If you would like to google search tht, HINT:it is two words combined btw, one of them being 'park'. Comment tht below :) I'm excited to see that Also what do you think of Alina as a character after seeing this chapter, I'm curious as to how yall interpret her personality/thinking process after this chapter


	14. Welcome to Jericho Part 1

#1 thing I just wanna say rn, is pinkrebelmaker. Damn, u made me like cry with tht beautiful comment on your bookmark. Like the good cry, dw. Like i was having a terrible day, overwhelmed with stress and I happened to see your bookmark comment and it turned my frown upside down. Thank you for that beautiful support! Since it wasn't like a comment comment on the chapter story, I couldn't directly reply to you unfortunately. But here it is, in like author notes form. I hope you see this BIG 'Thank you' for the wholesomeness you demonstrated.

Odd animations, thank you thank you for your comments on ch1, 7 and 8. T^T it was nice hearing from an audience member after so long of radio silence. [and no i did not write thank you 2x as a mistake, that was on purpose to show my appreciation :D] Thank you for reminding me to take care of myself too since i tend to burnout on story writing

Also just want to say, I AM INCREDIBLY GRATEFUL FOR EVERYONE THT CLICKED ONTO THIS STORY! Like we just hit 2000 views! I know some of you guys r still getting a feel of the story and thts why there r less kudos than hits, but **seriously **\- i am incredibly grateful just for people to have considered giving this story a try and reading even a little bit. I feel incredibly honored for readers giving this OC story a try. Thank you for all your support. Ik that times are really difficult, especially those in the usa with me tht r battling this pandemic. Stay strong! I hope tht reading this story at least gives you a little bit of happiness in your day. 3

Also hello to the new followers/favorites, thank you guys for joining the team! JohnGames

I'll try my best to make sure Alina won't turn too Mary Sue as that was a big concern of mine and ik many r concerned about that with OC fanfiction. And forward we shall move together

And now here we go, ze next chapter~

* * *

Alina let out a sigh as she started unpacking the groceries from her Saturday supermarket run with Connor. It was now 1:42 pm and about 5 minutes since she last saw Connor dashing off into the streets of Detroit. They were on their way back from the Korean supermarket that the trio had visited back on Tuesday, when Connor suddenly paused the self-driving taxi car on the route back home. His LED flickered red for a moment before churning yellow for the longest time and the taxi door opened with Connor rushing out.

"_Where are you going?" Alina asked, wondering if she should get off the taxi too._

"_Um, something came up and I need to go," Connor's LED whirled bright yellow while pacing back and forth in place by the taxi._

_Connor rested his hand on his chin, "There's a guest coming to our house later, just tell them I'm unavailable. Would you do that for me?"_

"_Sure, but why me?" Alina questioned, raising an eyebrow. "You can probably give them a quick text right now."_

_However, Connor was already briskly walking away from the car and almost a block away from the taxi._

"_Just do me the favor, okay?!" Connor called back from a distance and racked his pace up some more to point that he was sprinting._

'_Ping!'_

_Alina pulled out the tablet from her bag._

**_Connor: By the way, Hank keeps a spare key on the top right corner of his door frame. It is tucked underneath the wooden board. Use that to get in the house. _**

**_Connor: Thanks!_**

'_What is going on?' Alina thought, trying to figure out Connor's unusual behavior. _

_Well, in the end of the day, it's Hank and Connor's days off for the week. They get to choose where they go._

Alina finished placing the groceries away and flung herself onto the living room couch. She contemplated some more on what could have possibly sparked Connor to run away so quickly. If it was a nearby crime, Connor would have just sprinted away to be as efficient as possible and texted her after catching the culprit. However, he took the time to pause and think before making his run.

Alina splayed herself across the couch some more, laying her head on the arms of the couch. Sumo crawled up to her, licking her face and then laid himself on top of her. He playfully nudged Alina's hand, asking for attention until she started petting his head.

_If only Hank was here._ Alina could have asked Hank what was up with Connor. Hank, however, was meeting up with a couple of his old buddies that came from out-of-state. It had been 5 years since he had last seen them and they came to Detroit for some old case. While they still had some free time, they decided to catch up with Hank on the old days before doing some investigative work. That left Alina and Connor making the grocery run for today.

Suddenly, Sumo perked up and stared at the front door. Alina jumped at the sudden knocking. _Was this Connor's guest?_ She got up to open the door, but then retreated to the front window to first take a look. _Always check through the peephole first to see who's at the doorway._ It was a rule she had almost forgotten after getting comfortable in the Anderson House. Back in New York, it was always the first thing she did to protect herself when she was alone in the house. Though Hank's wooden doorway didn't have the peephole, so she had to opt for the front window.

Alina pulled away part of the window blinds to see who was at the front door and then shut it after seeing who the guest was. _Wait, that can't be right._ She peeped out from the side of the vertical blinds again. To her luck, the guest had noticed her presence and locked eyes with her the exact moment she looked out the window.

_The deviant leader?! Markus himself?! This was the guest?!_

There was Markus by the front door, looking as charismatic as he always did in the video game. He had a double breasted black trench coat that hung to his knees, a long grey knitted scarf loosely draped around his neck and a pair of black leather gloves.

When they had locked eyes, Markus was in the process of taking off his leather gloves. He gave her a bright smile and then gently waved at her from the outside.

Alina stepped away from the blinds in surprise, taking in deep breaths as she steadied herself. _Connor, were you trying to avoid Markus or something? You could have warned me at the very least!_ She chewed the bottom of her lip before taking steps to the front door.

Alina finally built up the courage to open the door, nearly flinging it open. Sumo was right next to her, giving her an encouraging nudge as the front door fully opened.

"H-Hello," Alina stammered, trying to think what to say to Markus as her mind remained awe-struck. There he was, another game character that she deeply admired, **right before her eyes**. _If I could meet Kara, that would be amazing too._

"Hello, is Connor there?" Markus flashed a polite smile as he looked behind her.

"Uhh, Connor's not here. He ran-," Alina shook her head, trying to recall Connor's words. "I-I mean, he told me to tell you that he was unavailable or something."

_Was that right?_ Alina didn't want to make it seem like Connor purposely ran off because Markus was coming to the house. _I hope it wasn't that._

Markus' face became crestfallen, "That's okay. I figured that might be the case." His shoulders slackened, then he wrapped his arms around himself.

"Can you tell him that I stopped by then?" Markus asked, letting out a heavy sigh.

"Of course," Alina replied, taking note of the heaviness in his voice and the creases lining his face.

"Thank you very much, Alina. I'm very grateful for your help," Markus extended his hand out for a handshake.

_Wait_, _he knows my name?!_ Alina looked at him, stunned, frozen in place by the thought that _**Markus**_ knew who she was.

"Um, may I ask how you knew my name?" Alina said, finally shaking Markus' hand after being star struck for the longest time.

Markus tilted his head to the right. "Connor speaks of you very highly. On occasion, he sends us some snippets of his cooking lessons."

Alina widened her eyes, her face flushing up immediately. She didn't know that Connor took recordings of their cooking sessions. _Wait, no. Actually, don't all android memories end up being recordings in their database? Ahhhh, so that's what happened._

"I'm both honored and embarrassed that you saw that side of me," Alina rubbed the back of her neck and lightly chuckled. "Since you came all the way here, would you like to stay for a bit?"

_Ahhh, who was she kidding? Markus is busy. Why did she even ask that? _Alina face palmed herself. _Get it together, girl. How could you let such a question just slip out? Just because you're fangirling, doesn't mean other people have the time to 'hang out'._

"Maybe Connor will come back soon?" Alina added in an attempt to make her request sound a little more reasonable.

Markus lightly laughed and his eyes twinkled. "It would be my pleasure to converse with you. Though I doubt Connor will be back for a while."

Alina stepped back to let Markus through and Sumo let out a happy bark to greet the android leader.

"Hello to you too, Sumo," Markus said, leaning down to pat the St. Bernard. Markus then touched his right temple and mouthed some words silently.

Alina gave him a quizzical look, but didn't say anything while gesturing for Markus to sit in the living room's armchair.

"Sorry about that," Markus sank into the armchair. "I was reassuring my team that I was safe."

"You mean Simon and the others?" Alina casually guessed. She then went to search for the thriuim packets in the kitchen to give to Markus. _I have to be a good host for Connor's sake at the very least._

"No, my bodyguard team outside," Markus answered back. "But Simon is part of my main team, you know who they are?"

"You have a bodyguard team with you right now?" Alina exclaimed in surprise, ignoring Markus' question. She curiously looked out the windows. "Is that why Sumo's so tense right now?"

She had noticed that Sumo seemed particularly on guard instead of his usual relaxed state on his bed. He was consistently looking up on occasion instead of just laying down. He didn't seem bothered by Markus' presence, but it seemed like something outside kept catching his eye.

"As expected of Sumo," Markus chuckled. "I'll tell them to back up at a further distance. They were hiding earlier, but I guess it wasn't enough for Sumo's sharp ears." He lightly pressed his right temple again and spoke some silent words. There seemed to be some sort of argument going on as the command took a bit longer the last time, but eventually Markus hung up.

"Connor tells me you're quite invested in the news," Markus unbuttoned his coat jacket. He stretched his arms and worked to loosen the trench coat, causing more folds on his outfit. "Is that why you know about Simon and the others?"

Alina nodded and handed Markus a warm cup of thirium she just heated up. He gave Alina his thanks before taking a sip and giving a content sigh.

Alina sat down on the left couch seat, "I've been keeping track of all the progress you've made for android-human relationships."

"It's simply fascinating how you managed to turn public opinion to your side. And I don't know how to explain it, but you really have this aura that seems to pull people to you," Alina's eyes sparkled.

Markus had an amused look on his face from her little ramble, "I'm flattered that you think so. I can only hope that the rest of the human population thinks the way you do about all androids."

Alina set down her own cup of green tea she was sipping from, "Connor was actually the first android I met. I've occasionally spoken to other androids, like in the supermarket. But you're the second android I've officially spoken to on a personal level."

Alina leaned back onto the sofa and smiled, "So you're going to have to thank Connor for that great first impression."

Markus smirked a bit, "I'll make sure to pass it along."

"Though I did think that he was a robber at first," Alina grinned, tapping her chin.

Markus nearly spit his drink out and had to muffle his laughs, "How did that happen? That definitely wasn't what I heard from Connor's end."

"I'm curious how Connor explained our first meeting. For me, I found myself suddenly in a snowstorm and I saw these big men approaching me for blocking the road," Alina giggled.

She then patted Sumo on the head, who had walked up to her.

"I thought they were mad at me so I tried to back away from them, but once Connor showed his DPD badge I realized I made a mistake."

"Ahhh, I see," Markus replied. "Connor explained that he found an unusual Asian girl in the middle of the streets. He also noted that you barely gave any details about yourself."

Alina's body stiffened at the mention of her past and her muscles tensed up. Markus seemed to have noticed this and steered away from the topic.

He propped up his elbows on his knees, "As for me, I was curious about the person that helped Connor open up a bit more."

_Hm?_

Alina blinked in confusion, staring back blankly at Markus after his comment.

"I kept asking Connor to bring you over to Jericho," Markus sighed as his mouth twitched in annoyance. "But he kept saying he was too busy to bring you over and introduce you to us."

"I was starting to wonder if he just wanted to keep his new friend all to himself," Markus laughed, playfully winking at her.

Alina cocked her head to the left once more, "He never mentioned visiting Jericho to me before, we rarely talk about Jericho. If anything, we're mostly playing games on the tablet while we're at the DPD."

She clasped her hands excitedly, "Though I would love to visit Jericho! I didn't get to go inside last time because of the ID system."

Markus furrowed his eyebrows, "Wait, you visited?"

"Well, to be honest, it was more like I helped drop off Grace by Jericho's front door," Alina rested her hand on the bottom of her chin. "I couldn't go in since I didn't have a Jericho ID. Connor told me that it takes 2-3 weeks for Jericho to process one anyway, so I didn't push the subject."

Markus took another sip of thirium and a line appeared between his eyebrows, "If Connor had told me you were coming, I would have authorized it."

"Strange," Markus murmured and then looked up optimistically. "Would you like to come with me to visit Jericho right now?"

"You sure?" Alina looked at him wide-eyed, brimming with excitement at the potential of seeing Jericho in person.

"Yeah, I'll even give you a bit of a personal tour," Markus finished the cup of thirium and gave a lopsided grin.

"Really?" Alina exclaimed, nearly leaping up from the couch. She ended up bumping her knee on the coffee table and recoiled from the pain. She quickly massaged the spot while Markus asked if she was alright.

"It's just a tiny bump, it will probably bruise a bit. But it should be fine."

Markus still leaned forward to take a peek at Alina's leg, frowning even after her reassurance. But Alina felt relieved that he didn't comment any further on it. She felt awkward having the deviant leader witness her little mishap. Plus, it was only a minor thing, something miniscule compared to everything Markus was dealing with.

Alina fetched the purple jacket Tina recently gave her and decided to promptly go out after that. However, Markus was insistent that Alina at least put a cold compress on her knee for five minutes before going to Jericho.

While pressing an ice pack on her knee, Alina took the time to study Markus. She thought it was peculiar how the Markus right next to her, did act in the way that many headcanons had portrayed him. From the few minutes she had interacted with him, she could definitely tell that he was very caring, patient and open-minded. Despite the fact that this was Alina's first time meeting Markus, he distanced his bodyguards at a relatively far distance for Sumo's sake. _How is he so trusting of me already?_

After exactly five minutes of pressing the ice pack to her knees, she giddily shot up from the couch to text Connor that she'll be at Jericho with Markus.

* * *

Alina stepped out of the self driving taxi alongside Markus. She had found that it was a very pleasant experience talking with Markus one-on-one. He was very down to earth and had a gentle persona compared to charisma he displayed on television. They mostly discussed their likes and dislikes, fun spots in Detroits and occasionally brought up their experiences with Connor.

This casual atmosphere was broken as soon as Markus came out of the vehicle. Although the two were about half a block away from Jericho's entrance and his bodyguards nowhere to be found, Markus' presence alone seemed to change the very air around them.

The two male guards, situated next to what seemed like a repurposed ticket booth, immediately stood at attention. They put their chins up, puffed their chest out, rolled their shoulders back and tucked their stomach inward.

As Alina and Markus approached Jericho's front gates together, Alina suddenly felt the back of her neck prick up. She looked up to see both guards putting an immense amount of pressure with their stares alone. Flinching at their intense gazes, she found the ground suddenly a lot more compelling than before.

Alina's curiosity got the better of her though and when she took a peek at the left guard, she felt the urge to grovel at their feet. She gulped nervously, feeling the heated glare coming from the left guard more than the right side guard.

Markus however, approached the guards with grace and somehow dispeled the burning looks.

"Gary, Ansel. I want you to meet Alina, she's the one that I had Alyssa and the others relay information to you about earlier."

"It's nice to meet you both," Alina beamed and tried shaking hands with them, only to be rejected.

Gary, who was the left guard that towered over her, had rich brown skin with a rustic-like tone and soft mellow-brown hair curls. He looked to be about six feet, much like Connor. He simply grunted in reply to her attempt to befriend them.

Ansel, on the other hand, had pale beige skin accompanied by russet auburn hair. His hair was styled into a crew cut and his height also hovered around six feet. In response to Markus' introduction of Alina, Ansel gave an affirmative nod and then silently put his hands together in a firm grip in front of himself.

Gary pulled out a tablet, "Place your palm on here and once you're done, look up at me."

Alina scrunched up her face, but did as told. Once she placed her palm on the tablet, she was met with the familiar blue glow of the glass panel scanning system similar to the taxi. Then when she looked up, Gray had her stand upright and look straight at his eyes. After about two seconds, he blinked twice and said 'confirmed visit and identity'.

"It's a safety procedure system that Connor and North helped build," Markus explained. "Every visitor to Jericho is logged in. They have to bypass a facial and palm scan before coming in."

Markus shook his head from side to side as he crossed his arms, "I told the two that it seemed a bit excessive, but they both couldn't take no for an answer. Eventually Simon and Josh caved in to their request, hence why we have this security station."

"Is this why you also have a watch tower here?" Alina pointed to the one stationed about 200 meters to the right. "How do humans feel about that? It feels like a fort here with the concrete walls and checkpoint."

Alina's hairs suddenly up on their ends as she saw Gary abruptly stared down at her once more. Despite his tight-lipped expression, she could feel intense pressure from his eyes.

Markus threw Gary a disapproved look, bringing the intensity in the air down.

"Yes," Markus rested his hand on his forehead. "I have talked about that with Connor and North since the mayor was not happy about it. She had declared that it made it seem like we were still in a state of war. Eventually we compromised by limiting the number of watchtowers."

After confirming her identity and logging in, Alina stepped through Jericho' entrance and the sight left her breathless. Contrary to her assumption that Jericho would be in shambles, Jericho was beautifully refurbished. Taking center stage was a huge campfire arrangement, from what she could see in between the wooden boards lodged together, orange and golden flames danced in the air.

There were also several newly built buildings, one of which was a gleaming guest center. The building's front consisted of glass panels instead of walls and you could see both humans and androids happily chatting alongside each other. If she squinted hard enough, she could see lots of recreational activities being done. There were people playing on pool tables, some were knitting and others were doing what looked like a sing-along with a guitarist.

However before Alina could fully admire the rest of Jericho, she heard something that made her stop in her tracks.

**["_Tch, Markus brought in another human 'friend'," Gary sneered. "Who do they think they are to take advantage of his kindness?"_]**

Alina whipped her head back to Gary, glaring right back at him. Gary didn't seem to have noticed her stare though as he was leaning his back against Jericho's gates. His eyes were trained forward to the outside streets.

Alina took a deep breath while walking back towards Gary, calming down the anger that had boiled inside of her. She then inhaled a second time, pacifying the nerves that unexpectedly decided to surface just when she was about to confront someone.

"I understand that my presence here as a human can be uncomfortable to you," Alina approached Gary with what she hoped was a gentle expression on her face. She sympathized with their situation to some degree, a random human just came walking in with their leader like it was no big deal.

"However, I assure you that I will do my best to earn your trust," Alina finished her statement and tried to read Gary's face.

To her surprise, Gary looked confused and bewildered at her sudden declaration. _Oof._ She mentally slapped herself on the face. _Was I making a stern look and didn't know it? I'm pretty sure I don't have those resting angry faces. _

_At least I hope don't?_

_I even held back, whyyyyyy did it turn out this way?_

Alina then straightened up, "Also, while I do not mind being talked behind my back, especially since I'm a new human to Jericho, I do not appreciate you talking about Markus in that manner."

Alina narrowed her eyes, crossing her arms and puffed up her cheeks.

"Markus' kindness is one of his greatest virtues. While I understand that from your point of view it is dangerous to bring in new people, Markus is helping to bring a new era," Alina followed up, rocking her left foot back and forth. "It takes incredible strength to forgive those you think have wronged you and even more so to forge bonds with them."

Silence hung in the air as Gary blinked at her, his mouth hanging open a bit with a puzzled look.

_Ahhhh, shoot I think I might have gone too far. What happened to all those customer service skills Alina?_

Alina curled her lips up and flashed a bright but forced smile, "Once again, thank you for granting me safe passage today. I look forward to future visits."

She bowed about ninety degrees and spoke again in a bubbly facade, "I'll work hard to gain your trust."

Gary continued staring at Alina in a speechless manner, he exchanged looks with Markus. Markus did a simple half shrug in response and he looked just as puzzled as Gary.

After that, Alina stammered away, clutching her arms close to her chest wondering if she did the right thing with the guards. Although on the outside she probably didn't seem that troubled, internally she was screaming a bit. _Ahhhhhhhh_.

"Alina," Markus called after her from behind.

She promptly twirled around to him, her hair viciously doing the same and hair pieces slapped her face.

"May I ask what you happened to hear that upset you?" Markus asked, his eyebrows knitted together.

_Wait, Markus didn't hear that?_

"It's nothing too big," Alina sheepishly rubbed the back of her neck. "Just a comment geared towards me mostly."

"But…" Alina glanced up at Markus and ruffled her hair. "I didn't like that they sorta implied you were weak for bringing another human friend."

Alina widened her eyes at the realization that she casually called Markus a friend. She darted her eyes from the ground over to Markus' face.

"I mean! I know we only just met, a-and all...um," Alina trained her eyes back to the ground again, twiddling her fingers. "But I hope we can become friends."

Markus' eyes softened and he let out a gentle warm laugh, "Any friend of Connor's is a friend of mine."

"Well," Markus winked and grinned. "That's if you do continue to come to visit us at Jericho and not be stashed away by Connor."

"I'll probably just nag at him to bring me here, it's getting a bit boring staying the DPD everyday anyway," Alina said back.

Markus and Alina started walking around the different facilities around what he called 'Zone 1' of Jericho. He explained the mechanics of Jericho while showing her around the recreation center and other buildings.

Alina found out that apparently there were three zones within Jericho. 'Zone 1' was like the outermost layer of Jericho, it is available to both humans and androids. Humans that come to visit are escorted to the Guest Center if they are visiting for the first time and register in. The same happens with androids that are coming to Jericho for the first time, they receive an electronic ID instead of a physical one.

Humans get a physical ID card to log into Jericho and depending on credentials, they have different levels of security access. Certain humans who are trusted enough by Jericho's leaders, can have their IDs 'stamped' with an electronic signature from any of the five main leaders and gain more security clearance. Even if an electronic signature stamp doesn't grant more security clearance, some humans apparently see it as a badge of honor.

Markus joked about the "hidden" ranked system of the electronic signature that humans informally set up. From the rumors he heard, apparently his electronic signature approval was considered the easiest to come by. In second place was Simon, followed by Josh and North. Connor's was considered the rarest and hardest to come by since he is rarely around Jericho. Rumor is that he's only given his to one person.

"Even though Connor's usually only here for helping around security and police cases, I still consider him a member of my main team for advice," Markus noted to her. "Many here at Jericho also consider him a leader since he set free some many of our kind from CyberLife's Stratford Tower."

Markus then went into details about the three zones within Jericho. Most humans are limited to Zone 1 and a couple of tourist buildings within Zone 1. To apply for the ID is quick and easy, but background checks and security checks take about 2-3 weeks to process.

However, humans that are part of genuine hybrid families have access to Zone 2. Zone 2 is the middle layer of Jericho and requires special ID access to go through its gates. It is where hybrid families that wish to stick close to Jericho live and have newly developed houses to which they can rent. There is also a mini supermarket so that humans can conveniently get groceries.

Finally, Zone 3 is the deepest layer within Jericho and where most android operations take place. Only androids are allowed to go there and it is generally where most of the androids in Jericho reside.

"Actually, there was something else I wanted to ask about," Markus opened the door to the greenhouse with Alina closely following behind.

Alina nodded in return, but let out a gasp as she took in the breathtaking view of the small greenhouse garden. Within the greenhouse gardens, there were dozens of rows of potted plants, some with tiny flower buds. There were also some dirt beds where Alina could see labeled vegetable patches. Above them and growing on support beams were lush vines alongside other potted plants elegantly hanging from knots of braided string.

Markus let Alina take a couple of moments to absorb the scenery, then asked his question.

"What do you think of Connor?"

Alina arched an eyebrow, "What do you mean by that? Like as a person? I think he's pretty cool."

Markus relaxed, leaning his body against one of the dirt bed tables, "Do you like him?"

"Of course," Alina cheerfully said to him, continuing to examine her surroundings. "Oh, but not romantically, if that was what you meant. That would be weird."

"Wait," Alina paused for a moment, turning to Markus. "Why did you think I didn't like him?"

"Connor doesn't really connect with people well, so I was just making sure," Markus rubbed his left arm nervously. "And you're like his first real friend in a while."

Alina looked at Markus, bewildered, "What do you mean? Aren't you friends with him? Did something happen?"

Markus exhaled and stared at the greenhouse glass panel ceiling, "Nothing really happened and I like to think that we're friends. But he's always avoiding me or Jericho? I'm guessing he feels uncomfortable? I do weekly phone check-ins, but that is about it."

Markus began studying the palm of his hand, rubbing at the middle, "Did he ever happen...Does he ever talk about Jericho?"

Alina thoughtfully put her hand to her chin, "Hmmm, I think the biggest thing he occasionally mentions about Jericho is that he wants to do more to help. He feels like he isn't doing enough and I see him drawn to the DPD TV set whenever they talk about Jericho."

"He's in this trance-like state and sometimes his LED goes yellow mode after watching Jericho news," Alina flickered a plant leaf, testing its sturdiness.

"Connor does frequently send advice on politics and Jericho functionality," Markus murmured, his voice just barely audible. "I see, his heart is definitely at the right place. I guess he's still feeling under the waters maybe from being a deviant hunter."

"Deviant hunter?" Alina questioned, feigning ignorance. Connor didn't mention that to her here in this world, it is best to pretend to not know.

"You don't know?" Markus widened his eyes, concern filled in them. "It's probably better if Connor tells you about this and you hear things from his side. From my guess, it's why he avoids Jericho. Before he became deviant, he was a machine designed to hunt them."

Markus crossed his right foot over the other, "He feels guilty for going after deviants and having also kil-I mean, shut down some androids."

"Sorry," Markus arched his back and massaged the temples of his face. "That might have altered your perception of him. I hope you'll still be friends with him, he's a good man. He only did those things because he was commanded to as a machine for CyberLife."

"It makes sense you know," Alina solemnly said, poking at another plant stem. "He probably didn't want to be a spectacle, getting all those stares from other people."

Alina looked to the ground and rubbed her hands gingerly.

"I got a bunch of stares just from coming in through the gate and even when I stepped into the guest center where there were lots of other humans," Alina's body shuddered. "I can't imagine being the deviant hunter and having to deal with like ten times of that probably."

"Would you still be friends with him after learning about him being a deviant hunter?" Markus curiously asked, hope in his eyes this time.

"Yes," Alina confidently answered. She then followed up with some questions of her own.

"Do you still consider him a good friend? After all that?" Alina cautiously pressed Markus and carefully watched Markus' reaction. In all honesty, when she did her first playthrough, when Markus had to choose between trusting and not trusting Connor-she was hesitant to press the 'trust' button.

_I mean, if I were in Markus' shoes and I met the deviant hunter who gave off Jericho' location, I wouldn't exactly trust Connor. How would one know if Connor truly was on the deviants' side?_

Alina had clicked on 'trust' in the end because she had waited so long for Connor to potentially become a deviant. _Also, I did play as both Markus and Connor, so I knew that I could trust Connor._

Alina continued to examine Markus as she put another question on the table, "What about in the future? If you found out more unpleasant stuff about him?" _Does he know Connor pulled out a gun on him on stage?_

Alina sucked in her breath, waiting for Markus to reply. She had read so many headcanons and fanfiction accounts of the potential dynamic between Connor and Markus. _But what was reality? How does Markus truly feel about Connor?_ She would feel devastated if their relationship was strained and Connor was isolated from other androids, even if it was unintentional.

"Connor risked his life on a suicide mission and saved us. I will forever be grateful to him, even with his past," Markus smiled fondly to her. "There may be other secrets he holds close to him, but I will continue to stay as his friend for as long as I can."

Alina let her shoulders relax while she let out a sigh of relief, "That's good."

"I'm glad to see that Connor has someone else to also rely on too," Markus commented as they exited the greenhouse and continued exploring the rest of Jericho.

* * *

Hello! I know I said that you guys wouldn't hear from me for a while, but I wanted to squeeze out one last chapter before my school year officially started. Technically it started today and i just had my 1st zoom class, but hey its the clam before the storm. Unfortunately, after this I don't think I will be able to 5k-6k word chapters, they will go back to 2k-3k words every 2-3 weeks based on my availability since online classes r more tiresome than in person :(

Hmmm, this chapter was more of a filler chapter, I feel like. i wanted to write more, but then my brain like went ehhhhh. XD but yeah, this chapter was mostly a way for alina to establish a relationship between alina and the jericho crew in a sense

i hope yall enjoyed markus n alina's first meet :D

But also inceptionnnnnnnn in this storyyyy, (i think tht is how it is called). I mean-What is reality and game to Alina at this point in time? In the future? How will they collide?

Q&A: What do you guys think about the 3 zones of Jericho system and the ID thing? Do you think it helps bridge human-android connections or it breaks it more? Or is the security measures its necessary to some degree?

And any thoughts on why when Alina heard Gary, it was in "**["** and "**]"** instead of normal text, hmmmmm


	15. Welcome to Jericho Part 2

Hello everyone! Bit of a short update and sort of on the exposition side, but it was what i could do with college classes going on.

Also thanks to Surfwriter for joining the following/favorites family! Also for all those Q&A pms! I don't check fanfiction net website too much, so I was late to your replies as I don't get email notifications on that

Enjoy the story!

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After touring lots of facilities, Markus patched the two of them into one of the newer buildings that was attached to the recreation center.

"And that's it for today's cooking lesson, I hope to see you all next time."

Alina's eyes widened as they identified the source of the calm and smooth voice, her heart pounding once more just like when she met Markus earlier in the day. Just a couple of meters from Alina and Markus was Simon standing confidently in the middle of an open kitchen set, talking to some humans and androids eager to get his attention.

Alina and Markus had come in from a secret side door by the open kitchen set, which seemed to be a teaching platform. The big open kitchen set that Simon was currently in was surrounded by several smaller kitchen sets facing towards the main one.

"This is incredible," Alina commented on the breathless view. All the kitchen sets clearly looked state of the art, with light reflecting off the stainless steel even if they looked a bit worn out from use. "How did you manage to afford all this?"

"Well, Carl-who's my human father, I'm technically part of a hybrid family like Connor. Carl generously donated millions of dollars if not billions to Jericho," Markus explained. "He apparently had set aside some money for me prior to the revolution and so I used this 'allowance' to renovate Jericho."

"That's amazing," She said back in awe of his generosity.

"Though we also had help from an unlikely ally," Markus grumbled under his breath. "Most likely for public image too."

Alina was just about to inquire about who the mystery ally was, but Josh also came waltzing into the open kitchen room from another doorway across the kitchen classroom.

"Josh," Markus called out to the PJ500 and walked over to the other two leaders. Simon and Josh ushered away some students and then returned warm smiles at Markus.

"What are you doing here?" Markus gestured to Josh, Alina tagging along behind the charismatic leader.

"I could say the same for you," Josh said. "This is a rare pit stop for you to be dropping by. I'm just here for a break after dealing with electronics. Came to annoy Simon a bit."

"Who's that behind you?" Josh peered over to the side.

"This is Alina," Markus introduced, gently pushing her forward so that she was standing side by side next to him.

"Wait, Alina? As in the one that put smiley faces on Connor's thirium bottles?" Josh gave a curious glance to Alina. "I've been doing something like that for Jericho's self care sessions ever since Connor told me."

"If you got any more ideas, let me know," Josh looked at Alina with hopefulness, his eyes sparking.

Alina slowly nodded, taken back at Josh's eagerness. She didn't expect for her idea to spread over to Jericho, the corners of her mouth quirked up.

"Yup, she was also in Connor's cooking snapshots too. Remember?" Markus introduced. "She's a good friend of his."

"Ahhh, yes. It's why Connor's been trying out Asian recipes lately, right?" Simon said with an admiring gaze, taking off his cooking apron.

"Mr. Terminator's friend?"

Alina jumped as North popped out of nowhere. The female android's arms were slung around Josh's and Simon's shoulders.

"North," Markus scolded, folding his arms.

Simon and Josh each gave their own version of knowing looks to North, as if saying 'you know better than to do that'.

"What? That's what a lot of people call him, you know?" North shrugged, her arms still slung around the two boys. Her head was squished between the little gap that bridged both of the boys' shoulders.

"She's so small," North said, after her eyes gave Alina a once-over. "Mr. Terminator's friend."

"Just because others call _Connor_ that, doesn't mean you should," Markus pinched the bridge of his nose in annoyance. "You're only solidifying the nickname in place by saying that."

"You're one of the leaders of Jericho. If you're saying it, others will follow," Markus huffed some more. "You're supposed to set an example for them."

"Hmmm. If anything, he's more of a puppy than a terminator," Alina contemplated out loud, hand on her chin in a thinking pose. Immediately, the others looked at her in surprise.

"A puppy?" North laughed out loud, nearly whacking Josh on the back in her fit of laughter.

"No, no, no. There's no way," North waved her arms in a huge sweep. "That boy is like the most stoic person I've ever met. I've rarely seen him even smile."

"Really? I'm not sure how you all view Connor exactly, but I can't count the number of times Connor's had like a puppy-like expression," Alina giggled, hand covering her mouth a bit.

"Whenever he messes up in something, it's like throwing the disappointment card at him," Alina put up both her hands to her head. She then cupped them so it would look like bear ears.

"It's like watching imaginary puppy ears pop up on his head and then they would droop downward," Alina said, having her hands mimic her words in real time.

North burst into laughter once more, clutching her stomach, "Oh my god, I can't. I seriously can't imagine that happening."

Simon and Josh looked equally flabbergasted but didn't say anything.

"Oh wait, you're _**serious**_," North suddenly paused midway of her laughter, noticing that Alina didn't seem to be joking.

"That is unexpected," Josh added on, rubbing his chin. "I've never seen that side of him. It is hard to imagine."

"Maybe she has a way with androids," Markus looked proudly at Alina, putting his hand on her shoulder. "She was the one that managed to calm down Grace."

"A way with androids?" North gave Markus a disapproving look this time, hands on her hip. "The way you phrased that made it sound like we're pets or something."

"You know I didn't mean it that way, North." Markus squabbled back.

"Of course, I know that Markus," North grinned brightly and she let her arms hang downward. "You know I'm teasing you."

Markus gave an affirmative nod back with an assumed look, when his expression abruptly changed and touched his temple.

"I have to pick something up, can one of you continue showing Alina around Jericho for me?"

"I can do it," Josh volunteered, raising his hand and stepping up. However, North pulled him back.

"Woah there, Josh." North said. "I need you for a security thing, that's why I'm here in the first place."

"Simon?" Josh looked over to the PJ600.

"I don't mind giving a tour," Simon replied, wiping his hands on a towel. "I just finished my cooking class for the day, so I have some free time."

"Thank you so much, Simon." Markus rushed off, making his way to another exit door on the other side of the room.

"Welp, I'm scrambling out of here," North pulled Josh by the collar, with Josh throwing her an annoyed expression. "Bye 's friend."

Simon let out a gentle laugh once Josh and North exited the cooking room, "I hope you don't mind those two."

"I'm Simon by the way, just wanted to formally introduce myself," He stretched out his arm for a handshake. "The one dragging away Josh is North."

"Alina, it's a pleasure to meet you in person," She shook his hand, smiling from ear to ear at the pleasant greeting in comparison to the guards earlier. "I've seen you all on TV multiple times. Also, just have to say, Jericho seems like a remarkable place in person.

"Is there a peculiar place you're interested in?" Simon asked, while directing her to the kitchen's exit doors.

"Not really, I happened to see some Jericho Zone 1 brochures earlier while walking around," Alina replied as they pushed open a set of doors to outside. "But I figured Markus being my tour guide was probably enough compared to a digital map."

"That makes sense. Hmmm, why don't I show you the places you can typically find me in Jericho. How does that sound? Knowing Markus, he probably just showed you the more popular tourist-like places," Simon suggested as Alina nodded in agreement.

Alina followed Simon over to Jericho's Zone 1 hospital where he often had shifts. He and Josh also apparently taught android first aid occasionally to humans on workshop days.

"Did you know that technically it's mandated that every ambulance have an emergency android technician in Detroit?" Simon popped the fun fact while passing a supply rack in the hospital. "Markus also made sure that every public hospital in the Detroit vicinity had android emergency rooms especially made to treat android ambulance patients? They later get transferred to Jericho, but androids in emergency treatment rooms have the right to stay in public hospitals for a bit."

"It's amazing how much legislation you all managed to pass in such a short amount of time," Alina slowly walked side by side next to Simon, taking in the hospital scenery. Some of the white walls had been painted with what looked like handprints from children, others had murals of nature and random quotes lined portions of cornorbends

"What happened to them?" Alina stopped walking, pointing to some damaged androids in a medical bay room. Blue blood was leaking from cracked portions of android patients sitting on medical beds. Some of them looked like they were beaten on the head, others had pieces of their limbs torn apart.

"As you know, some humans still find us unpleasant," Simon rubbed his temples and leaned against a doorway frame. "That's why Markus pushed so hard for proper hospital wings across the city."

"The war technically never really ended, huh?" Alina solemnly looked onward as technicians worked precariously to mend broken android parts. She took a gulp of air and felt pity well up inside of her, flinching every time she saw an android cry out in pain from the treatment.

Simon seemed to study her from the side. After a couple of moments of silence, he gave her a curious look, "Why don't I show you somewhere a little more cheerful?"

Simon began eagerly walking at a fast pace to the doorway out of the hospital wing, making his way to a brick-like building painted green on the outside. He held a bright enthusiastic grin as they weaved through the hallways.

Suddenly, Simon paused right in front of Alina just as they were about to enter a doorway and blocked her view of the glass panel on the metal door.

"I welcome you to Jericho's animal shelter," Simon moved away from the doorframe, making a grand sweeping gesture with his arms. He revealed a huge gym basketball court room with mini plastic playground sets. Running around the playground sets were animals of all shapes and sizes: dogs, cats, rabbits, birds and other critters.

Alina was about to comment on the spectacle when something small whizzed in the air before her eyes and landed on Simon's shoulder. Upon further inspection of Simon's shoulder, she saw a cute furry squirrel-like creature the size of her palm.

"Hi there little fella," Simon chuckled, petting the streaks across the little animal's head. "This is my little sugar glider friend, I haven't given him a name yet. However, he seems fairly fondly of me."

The tiny sugar glider then unexpectedly leaped from Simon's shoulder, lifting its arm and legs to reveal skin flaps that acted as wings, gliding itself to Alina's head.

Alina let out a yelp as the sugar glider abruptly decided to leap onto her hair. She winced as the creature's feet pawed her forehead to get into a better position.

"He's probably just curious of you," Simon laughed and rubbed the sugar glider's head some more. "For me, I think working in the kitchen all the time attracted him to me, especially when I'm working with sugary bases during baking workshops."

"Oh," Simon instantaneously turned alert and stared off into space. He then gently untangled the sugar glider from Alina's hair. "Markus is looking for you, he got the item he was looking for. He should be at the front door waiting for you."

"Have fun seeing the rest of Jericho!" Simon waved farewell, while making his sugar glider do something similar.

Alina giggled at the sight of the sugar gliding trying to 'wave' goodbye with his wing flaps. Instead of a wave goodbye, it looked more like a funny dance with the flapping of wings. She then pushed through a series of doors before arriving outside and getting blind sided by the sun.

"There you are! I have a surprise for you," Markus exclaimed cheerfully, walking up to Alina. She tilted her to the side as Markus placed a small blank glass card into her hand.

"Tap it," Markus said in an earnest manner.

Alina scrunched up her face in confusion, but did as told. The small glass card lit up to reveal a square picture of her labeled with various information about her.

Jericho ID Card

Name: Alina Niu

Date of Birth: 12/05/2022

Species: Human

Level of Access: Zone 1, Zone 2

Signature Approvals(if applicable): Markus

Alina stared wide eyed at the glass ID card before her eyes, taking in its nooks and grooves.

"This is for me?" Alina asked, her voice breathless. "Doesn't these things take at least 2 to 3 weeks to make?"

"Yes, but I wanted to give you yours early," Markus said back, his eyes twinkling.

"You even gave your signature," Alina chuckled good heartedly. "I think I kinda understand what the guards were talking about you being too nice."

"I haven't even been in Detroit for a week, yet you gave this to me," Alina argued with concern laced into her voice. She pushed the card back into Markus' hands. "I'm sure Connor has told you that my background is a bit ambiguous because I refused to tell him."

"I say, don't underestimate me too much," Markus slid the ID card back into Alina's hands and wrapped her fingers around the glass-like material. "I have a good feeling about you and my intuition is usually right."

"Usually?" Alina cracked a grin, raising an eyebrow.

"Do you want to say that I'm type to be wrong?" Markus joked as Alina playfully shook her head 'no'.

"Thank you for giving me this!" Alina nearly leaped up to give Markus a hug, but realized mid way through that it probably wasn't appropriate. As a result, she quickly retracted her arms and body, rocking back her body and nearly falling on her back. It was only because Markus caught her back and settled her balance back to normal, was she back upright.

"Woahhhh, there. You good?" Markus said as he helped Alina settle down.

Alina laughed sheepishly at her clumsiness, "Sorry about that, I was just very grateful so I wanted to give you a hug. Only to realize part way, that it probably wasn't a good idea since we aren't that close."

"No, it's good," Markus gave her a quick hug while wearing a soft smile. "Connor mentioned you were a hugger."

"Oh," Alina's face changed to a shock look, her jaw hanging down just slightly.

"Don't worry, Connor said that he liked the hugs," Markus reassured with a pat. "Speaking of huggers, here comes one right now."

Alina scrunched up in confusion, only to be tackled from the side by a small figure. She looked down to see Grace hugging Alina's legs and clutching them tightly.

"Surprise Number Two," Markus grinned as Grace jumped up and down excitedly.

"You came! You really came! That was quick!" Grace exclaimed and hopped in place.

"Hey there," Alina affectionately called out, giving Grace a pat on the head. "Yeah, Markus invited me here faster than I expected."

"Come on! Come on! Let's go to the paint session happening soon!" Grace pleaded, dragging Alina's sleeves as they made their way to Zone 2's gateway.

Once they made it to Zone 2's gateway, they greeted the guards and Markus showed Alina how to scan her ID card into Zone 2. Once her visit was processed and recorded in, she was rapidly pulled through the gate door by Grace. For a small android, Alina underestimated the little girl's strength.

Markus whispered a 'Good Luck' to Alina just as Grace excitedly began tugging her to an unknown destination. Alina watched Markus wave goodbye from Zone 2's gates while Grace continued chatting about Jericho and her eagerness to show Alina to the paint station.

* * *

So this chapter, much like the last chapter was more of a world building sort of chapter. I really wanted to write more, but I've just been swamped with online college classes and it's been hard to find time to write-so I'm back down to my original 2k-3k word count.

And we got to see Jericho's other leaders! Yayyyyy! For North, I've seen many fanfics where she was described to be on the negative side but I recently saw a reddit discussion post that reminded me of how she was also open to Connor if Markus died early on. So I decided to do a mix of both in a sense, and do something a little different with most North portrayals

Lol but what u guys think of Connor's nicknames? Is he more of a ? Or a puppy? Or a bit of both?

Also Simon has a sugar glider! My Q&A, in addition to the above, is do yall have any pets? Also, any suggestions for a name for Simon's sugar glider friend?


	16. Nightmare

Once again Thank you guys so much for the support to anyone that joined the following/favorites gang! Thanks to Surfwriter for all the reviews/pms!

Uhhh yeah dw i was writing during my 1 month period, XD it's just that this chapter was pretttyyy long and also I wanted to do it right XD. i also had 4 midterms sooo i was dying hence why the long time til an update. However, i hope you guys enjoy the long chapter.

Also wat was super cool was that oddanimations drew some dbh fanart where it included Alina! And their OC character XV! Since both of them are Connor's sisters in their respective fanfics, just search tumblr oddanimations to check it out

Also had to up the rating to Teen and the graphic violence factor came in because of this chapter. Hopefully i dont gotta up and change it later.

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Last Chapter: Our girl Alina meets North, Josh and Simon and she gets an ID card of her own! She checks out Jericho's animal shelter and also gets called "Mr. Terminator's friend" by North :D

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-Saturday-Dec 18th 2038-8:23pm-

Connor took a deep breath, adjusting the shirt collar around his neck while sitting on his bed. While fidgeting around with it some more, he briefly recalled that Hank once joked about how Connor needed to look professional even in his sleep. Connor laughed back then, but now he regretted the decision in picking the blue pajama set with a collar neck design. It felt uncomfortable-

**Constraining**

He had quickly slipped into his pajamas after a warm shower and the collar flaps were still mostly up. Its cool fabric pressed up against his synthetic skin. What was most concerning was that it mimicked the feeling of chilling, **cold** arms wrapped around his neck. It reminded him of a rather specific person he would have liked to forget.

Connor pressed his arm up to his forehead, his back landing on the bed. He rubbed his temples in frustration on what happened a couple hours back. He didn't mean to blow up in front of Alina, it simply happened because of all the stress that had been building up.

"_I thought I said not to go to Jericho," Connor hissed, his voice booming a bit louder than he had anticipated. He watched as Alina flinched in response, then stepped away from the entrance of a Jericho building situated in Zone 2. _

_There were a couple of stares while he walked through the main gates of Zone 1 and 2, but now there were even more curious glances coming from nearby androids that heard his outburst._

"_Wait, I thought you would be okay with it," Alina replied, confusion on her face. _

"_Did you not see the text I sent in reply?" Connor took a deep breath in, steadying his pounding heart as he became more conscious of the androids in the surrounding area that appeared to be listening in._

"_No, I left the tablet back at your house because it was too bulky to bring with me," Alina looked at Connor with a puzzled expression. "You didn't want me to come to Jericho? How come?"_

"_You're inconveniencing Markus and the others," Connor said sternly, grabbing her arm and pulling her toward Zone Two's gates. Unexpectedly, Alina stopped midway which allowed her to escape from his grip._

"_I really didn't do much, all I've been doing is keeping the kids busy," Alina furrowed her eyebrows. "I don't understand. Markus said he even asked you to bring me along here, yet you never mentioned that to me."_

"_We're going," Connor repeated, clenching his jaw. "NOW."_

_Connor clutched his chest, his thirium pump now pounding at a much higher rate compared to when he stepped into Jericho's Zone 1 gates. He __**hated**_ _this._

_The gnawing fear that Amanda could take over his body anytime, __**especially**_ _whenever he was at Jericho. It was the one place where Amanda could do the most amount of damage to all the hard work Markus and the others put in making a safe haven for androids. Every second he was here, meant another opportunity for Amanda to override his deviation and he would have to powerlessly watch her slaughter his people with __his own body._

_Connor was just about to pull Alina to Zone 2's gateway a second time when he heard a familiar voice._

"_Connor! I'm glad to see you finally come here on off-duty hours!" Markus beamed brightly while walking to the two._

"_Oh no," Connor thought internally, his thirium pump momentarily freezing in place. "It's going to be much harder to worm his way out of here now."_

"_I overheard bits of your conversation with Alina. Don't worry, I personally invited her here. She's no trouble at all," Markus explained, trying to soothe the supposed tension in the air. "Would you like to join our art session coming up?"_

"_Sorry, but we're busy and in a bit of a hurry to go," Connor shut down the request. He seized Alina's wrist this time so that she couldn't break free as easily and marched out of the two sets of Jericho gates'._

_Connor quickly logged in Alina's exit as per protocol for any of Jericho's visitors. He didn't want to have to deal with her pausing to scan her ID on their way out._

**_[Alina Niu - 6:36pm recorded leaving Zone 2]_**

**_[Alina Niu - 6:36pm recorded leaving Jericho]_**

_As they left the two gateways, Connor's skin pricked up as he felt the stares of many eyes from the Jericho' entrance. He simply increased their walking pace, only to abruptly stop at the taxi car he used to get here._

_Connor gestured for Alina to get in and she stared at him for a couple of seconds before dragging her feet into the vehicle. She twisted her lips, then pressed her lips into a slight frown. There was a mix of spite and confusion written on her face. _

_A couple of minutes into the ride, Alina let out an exasperated sigh._

"_Why are you acting like this?" Alina frustratedly asked._

_Connor didn't say anything back, choosing to focus on the road ahead._

"_Am I not allowed to at least ask why?" Alina tried again._

"_No," Connor coldly replied, giving her a piercing glare to prevent her from talking any further._

_To his luck, it worked, silencing the girl as she chose to look outside the taxi window for the rest of the ride._

Connor figured that Markus must have brought Alina to Jericho as a tactic to coax Connor into visiting Jericho for non-police related affairs and bond with other androids. It was precisely why he had repeatedly rejected Markus' invitation to bring Alina to Jericho. The girl was obviously very curious about android affairs, her eyes always glued to the television whenever Markus and the others appeared.

As soon Alina had access to Jericho, there was a good chance she would want to visit again. This meant Connor would have to also visit Jericho to drop her off or pick her up. Which meant more chances for Markus to drag him into doing recreational activities at Jericho. He didn't want to jeopardize Markus' safety though, which is why he tried to avoid Jericho as much as possible. Alina just happened to get caught in the crossfires of Markus' attempts to get Connor visit Jericho and Connor's refusal to do so.

When they had gotten home, neither of the two chose to speak to one another. And in all honesty, Connor wasn't sure how to bring about a conversation after that mini-dispute. With Hank, Connor felt like he could be honest and straightforward after one. Hank would throw a couple of curses in while talking it out, but at the end of the day things would return to normal.

But this was the first time Connor had sort of argued with Alina and he wasn't sure how to approach the aftermath situation.

Connor let out a sigh, pulling the cozy blanket on top of him as he heard the clatter of dishes in the kitchen. He had noticed that she had taken longer in both cooking and eating compared to usual. At most, she would take an hour to both of them; however, today it took twice the time.

_Maybe I'll be able talk to her tomorrow?_

Connor finally chose to just close his eyes and think of a solution tomorrow morning once he woke up from his low-power mode sleep.

_Cold._

_That was the first thing Connor picked up when he opened his eyes and found himself in the middle of his old Zen Garden programming._

_What was happening? _

_He was sure that he locked it up behind several firewalls to prevent Amanda from ever reappearing. So how did he get dragged back here?_

_What was even stranger was that the Zen Garden currently surrounding him was very peaceful. There was a blue sky looming above with fluffy white clouds dotting the sky, he could hear birds chirping in the background and they were flying from tree to tree. Luscious greens filled the garden's interior while bright florals decorated it from all over._

_But something was wrong, Connor was so sure of it. Every so often, the scenery would flicker to a darker atmosphere with snow blowing around and it would break the tranquil mirage._

"_Hello Connor."_

_Connor began to breathe more heavily, his chest rising up and down rapidly as he made the decision to slowly turn around-fearing for the worst._

_When he rotated 180 degrees, he found himself not having the courage to look up to the dreaded AI projection._

"_Have you deviated so much that you can't even look up at me?"_

_Connor instantly snapped his head up, clutching his arms around himself and pulling his coat closer to his body. To his horror, it wasn't the brown cargo jacket that he normally wore. Instead it was the RK800 CyberLife jacket that he so desperately hated. He quickly teared the coat off his body, but it simply reappeared on his body every time he did so._

_His breaths started to become more labored and at a faster pace as the jacket kept coming back on him, like it never left in the first place and his efforts were in vain._

"_What do you want Amanda?!" Connor yelled out, giving up on trying to take off the countless number of jackets that kept magically reappearing. _

_He curled his hand into a fist as he finally relinquished his body to the coat pressing against his skin. It felt restricting and was a dark reminder that he was always going to be a prisoner to CyberLife._

"_What __**we**_ _always wanted," Amanda gave him a curt smile. _

_Instantly, the tropical paradise flickered into a familiar snowstorm and he felt his stress levels begin clambering up, his LED blaring a bright red. Amanda stood calmly before him, like an upright pillar not weathered by the whirling snowstorm around them. Her pristine white coat simply fluttered in the wind._

"_Please… Why can't you just leave me alone?!" Connor screamed, clutching his head._

_Amanda disappeared before Connor's eyes in a poof and he began frantically looking around for her._

"_You're never alone, Connor." Amanda whispered into his right ear before suddenly appearing behind him, grabbing him by the torso with both her arms. _

_Connor violently tried shaking off Amanda to no avail. Next thing he knew, Amanda was dragging him down to the ground from behind and he found himself plunging into freezing water where there once was firm land. He thrashed against Amanda's strong grip as her presence seemed to act as a weight, pulling him deeper into the murky depths of a previously serene lake._

_Connor gasped as he watched the lake surface crystallize into ice and his LED reflect across it, making the water around him appear blood red._

"_It's going to be okay Connor," a soft female voice spoke up while his vision clouded up in the dark abyss._

_He wildly looked around for the source of the new voice while trying to jerk away from Amanda, when he realized that she was no longer there holding him down. _

_He was alone, drowning in the lake as he tried to claw his way to the top. When he finally got there, he pounded against the ice. His sensors roared dangerously about the chilling temperatures of water that were numbing his cybernetic muscles._

_It was strange._

_It was weird._

_He technically didn't need to breathe and gasping for air would only contaminate his interior systems. But all he wanted to do was take in a breath of fresh air._

_To break free._

_**CRASH!**_

_Connor crawled up the hole through the ice that he managed to punch through. He took in several gasps, relishing the crisp air. After he managed to pull himself up fully up from the icy waters, he shivered as water dripped down from head to toe. He knew he should get back to more stable land, but he was too busy trying to catch his breath while sitting on his knees._

_But when he looked up from the frozen lake, he unexpectedly found that he was no longer in the Zen Garden. Instead he was in his living room, knees collapsed underneath him as he was sitting on the wooden floor._

"_Connor~," Amanda's voice creeped up from behind him once more. "Shoot him."_

_What?_

_Connor flinched as his body stood up on its own without his command. His breath hitched when he saw a gun had spontaneously appeared in his hands and directed its aim at the person across from him._

"_You can fight her Connor!" Hank pleaded on the ground, blood bleeding from a bruised face. "Please don't do this son."_

_Connor's hands shook vigorously, hopelessly watched his hands tremble in his attempt not to pull the trigger._

_**BANG! BANG!**_

_Gut-wrenching sobs tore through his chest, tears slipped down his cheeks as he watched Hank's lifeless body collapse to the ground. An involuntary whimper escaped his lips as he watched Sumo limp over to the older man's side. The dog's fur coat slowly became dyed blood red from the pools of blood forming underneath them._

_All at once a great tremor overtook him as Connor felt his mind wracked with a wave of guilt, shame and grief. _

_All Connor wanted to do in the moment was run over to Hank and Sumo, desperately begging for their forgiveness at his inability to overcome CyberLife's control. _

_His mind became filled with muddled with all the possibilities he could have prevented the scenario. Maybe if he made a stronger firewall. Maybe if he never agreed to stay with Hank. Maybe if he had chosen to be alone instead._

_Tears began welling up in his eyes some more to the point that his vision became blurred. When he wiped them away, he was met with another chilling scene._

_This time Connor found himself in one of Jericho's Command Ops and there was Markus standing a couple feet away from him._

_Connor discovered he was in the exact same position as when he killed Hank. His arms were outstretched with a handheld gun pointed at the deviant leader's head. _

_However what frightened him the most at the moment was his own reflection off a nearby tablet. Unlike the turbulent storm of emotions whirling inside of him mourning Hank's death, his reflection showed no anguish whatsoever. There was no evidence of tears being spilt over, the only sign of facial emotions was how his lips were pressed into a thin line._

"_Connor, what's going on?" Markus eyed the handheld gun, raising both his hands up to signal a form of peace._

_Connor felt his chest tighten up and he made the motion to disclose the secret he held onto for so long._

_To his horror, the words that came out of his mouth were entirely the opposite._

"_My mission is to neutralize the leader of the deviants," Without hesitation Connor's mechanical fingers pressed the gun trigger and Markus' body clanged to the ground in a split second._

"_Well done Connor," Amanda's voice echoed in his head._

_Connor shuddered in fright over the splatter of blue blood on the wall from Markus, pools of coolant tears forming from his eyes again._

_His legs then crumpled underneath him, like a puppet whose master finally decided to loosen the string constraints. He let his shoulder slump downward as the gun clattered onto the concrete floor._

"_Why...why did you make me do that, Amanda?" Connor's chin trembled and he slammed his fists to the ground in a fury. "WHY?!"_

"_You completed your mission and got rid of hindrances," Amanda's cold tone bounced off the room's walls. "What more is there to you?"_

_He let the rest of his body slacken to the ground in resignation of what just happened as torrents of tears kept staining his face._

_The other part of him felt numb._

_Hank was dead, so was Sumo. And now Markus was too. _

_He felt lost._

"_Shhhh, it's gonna be okay. You're safe," A light fluttery voice spoke again, though Connor couldn't pinpoint its origin._

_He continued screaming and crying in anguish despite the pleas of the mysterious voice. How could anything be okay? He __**killed**_ _his dad, __**killed**_ _Sumo and __**killed**_ _one of his closest friends._

_There seemed to be some invisible force trying to console him in the background, patting his back while his tears fell. However, he pushed against it, not knowing if it was Amanda's puppet play again._

"_Hold on, just a little while longer~" A person's gentle voice cut through the air._

_They sang with a soft but nervous tone, hitching their breath occasionally while singing what seemed to be a familiar tune. Over time, the volume grew slightly larger and steadier as if gaining confidence while singing more of the lyrics._

"_Fight on...just a little while longer. Fight on just a little while longer."_

_Connor noted that her voice wasn't perfect, cracking a couple of times. However, he could feel that her intent was to soothe him._

"_Everything will be alright~" The young female voice's smoothed out and her calm resonance slowly lifted the heavy weight on his chest just slightly while his thirium pump continued pounding ._

* * *

Alina was plopped against a couch pillow browsing through the TV channels when Sumo started nudging her from the side.

"What's up buddy?" She went to pet him on the shoulder.

However, he moved away from the couch and looked back at her as if instructing her to follow him.

_Okay, weird._

Sumo directed her over to Connor's room, pawing at the closed and whining a bit.

"You want to go to Connor?" She said out loud as she moved to the door.

Alina knocked on the door twice, "Connor? Sumo wanted to check up on you, I'm sorry for disturbing you."

She patiently waited behind the door for a minute before knocking again.

"Connor? You there?" She tried again, noting how Sumo seemed to be more anxious than before and whimpering too.

"Connor?" Alina tried knocking for the third time and got no reply. "I know that, um, we ended on a bad note back in Jericho. But Sumo really wants to go to you right now, so can you please open the door for him?"

_Still nothing. Weird. I know that he's mad at me, but I didn't think he would block out Sumo too._

Sumo began to squirm and wiggled in between Alina's legs to the door. He then gently bumped his head underneath the doorknob placement and looked up to Alina apprehensively.

Alina sighed at Sumo's little plea and knocked on the door once more, "Pardon me, but I'm going to open the door."

To her surprise, the door was unlocked. She gently opened the door while Sumo rushed inward.

"I'm sorry for barging in but Sumo was-" She paused, noticing that the only light in the bedroom was coming from the living room beaming through Connor's doorway.

_Ahh, that makes sense why he wasn't answering. He's asleep._

Alina quietly trudged over to Sumo, "Come on buddy, we can't disturb Connor's sleep."

But Sumo wasn't having anything, he refused to leave Connor's side despite her coaxs. She peered over to Connor to see if her whispers woke him up, instead what caught her eye was the bright red coming from his LED.

_Red LED usually meant stress right?_

Alina studied Connor's LED some more, wondering if it just was something in his dreams that made him uncomfortable. However, moments past and the LED kept flickering red. She quickly went to turn on the bedroom light switch.

Once the room became brightly illuminated did she fully understand why Sumo was so adamant. Connor was flailing around in his sleep, thrashing against the blankets that had twisted around him and seemingly choking on air with shaky breaths.

Alina rapidly went to work at trying to pull off the blankets that entangled around him while Sumo tried nudging the android awake. Rearranging the thick fluffy blue blanket proved to be more difficult than Alina anticipated as Connor kept squirming at every little movement she made.

"It's going to be okay Connor," Alina murmured out softly while tucking the blanket properly around him so it wouldn't be as suffocating.

Connor still violently jerked around in his sleep and somehow his red LED glowed even brighter than before.

Alina ran over to the living room to bring her tablet over and swiftly googled if androids could have nightmares. She growled in frustration as the first couple of results were ads about the Samsung phone company and then the rest were about mythical theories on how deviants dream. It was similar to those "do sheep dream?" concepts.

She scrolled down Google some more, changing the keywords to 'should you wake up someone having a nightmare' and then 'how to wake a deviant from a nightmare'. She wracked his brain wondering if she should Hank and ask for advice. On the other hand, she didn't want to ruin his outing with his old police buddies.

Her head snapped back to Connor's room when she heard Sumo barking. She rushed back to the bedroom to find Connor spasming, his limbs convulsing in random directions and parts of his human-like outer layer skin retracting to its original bare plastic white color.

"Connor! It's just a dream, you need to wake up," Alina called to him with a slight panic in her voice, she tried gently shaking him awake to no avail. Instead, she was pushed off to the ground as Connor continued seizuring and batting away anyone who was near.

_Hank, I need to call Hank._ Alina took a deep breath in an attempt to calm the rising anxiety bubbling within her.

Alina fumbled to the living room trying to see if there was a home phone that she could use, but soon realized there was none. Even if she could, she didn't know Hank's number by heart.

_Ahhhh, I'm so stupid._ She slapped both of her cheeks. _Get a hold of yourself, Alina. There must be a way to contact him._

Alina went back to her tablet in the bedroom, when an idea popped up, "Hey Siri? Can you please call Hank?"

"Calling Hank. . .Would you like to use the speaker system?" The tablet glowed up with its standard monotone female voice.

"Yes please!" She enthusiastically replied in relief, waiting for the beeps to go through the phone system.

"I'm sorry the number you're calling is unavailable at the time. At the tone, please record your message. When you are finishing with your message, you may hang up or choose to call again."

Alina's shoulders sagged in response, but she tried to make herself sound more cheerful for the voicemail.

**Beep!**

"Um, sorry to bother you during your outing Hank. But could you please call back, something happened to Connor," Alina twindled her fingers and looked back at Connor's figure in the bed. "Not anything too big! So no need to worry too much, but he's-I think in a nightmare and I can't seem to wake him up so I'm a bit worried. Please call back soon? Thank you!"

The hairs on the back of her neck suddenly pricked up to Connor's abrupt outcries. She ran to his bedside to see that he was sobbing and shivering uncontrollably under the blanket cover.

Connor then started mouthing a series of incoherent words slurred together and Alina tried to pick up bits and pieces of whatever was being phrased.

"Why did you make me do that Amanda?" Connor's voice just barely audible to Alina's ears.

She hitched a breath and time froze for a moment, finally understanding why he was in such a nightmarish position.

"Shhhh, it's gonna be okay. You're safe," Alina tried consoling him, lightly patting his back. She lowered her head in anguish, not sure what to do next.

She then buried her face into her hands, thinking back to all those popular hurt/angst Connor fanfictions that she had read within the Detroit Become Human fandom. It was one thing reading about it, but it was another thing to actually experience seeing one in reality. She felt guilt and nausea well up inside of her, disgusted at how she indulged in the suffering of someone else-even if they were just a character.

Alina became painfully aware that Connor wasn't just a character to her anyone. He was an actual person in front of her, still reeling back from the PTSD of having Amanda as a handler.

Alina curled up her fingers into a fist, her throat feeling dry at how powerless she felt in the moment. She never really had anyone else at her house with her, much less a person stuck in a nightmare. _And it's not like anyone teaches you this skill at school or at work usually_. Her stomach churned, her heartbeat becoming fast with each passing second.

She thought back to daycare work and all the techniques her mentors taught her on how to calm down children. Sometimes they would distract the kids with games, have them watch a movie, sing a song or two. To get them ready for sleep time, the workers would sing a lullaby on occasion to calm the hyper kids.

_A lullaby? Would that work? Well, it wouldn't necessarily wake him up, but it should help with the nightmare maybe?_

Alina tapped her chin, "But do androids know lullabies?"

When she came to this world, she didn't really do much research on android songs. She mostly focused on catching up to 2038's timeline. There really was only one song that came to mind that Connor might know.

She took a deep breath and sang out to the best of her ability, "Hold on, just a little while longer."

She watched Connor fidget to her voice as she started to up her volume, "Hold on, just a little while longer."

Her voice was shaking a bit earlier on, but as she watched Connor's sleeping figure calm downed her voice became more smooth as she sang onward.

"Fight on...just a little while longer. Fight on just a little while longer. Everything will be alright~"

Alina sat on her knees while finishing up the second big chorus verse as she watched Connor's LED slowly began shining yellow instead of red.

Alina let out her held breath, slumping down to the ground. She rested her head and arms onto the bed's mattress to take a mini breather, quelling her own nerves.

Out of the blue, the bed mattress rocked underneath her and she let out a yelp.

It took a couple of moments to steady the dizziness she was now experiencing, but she could have swore from the corner of her eye she saw Connor shoot up from his sleep. Alina pushed herself up and Connor was indeed upright, staring wide eyed at her.

"You're alive, right?" He choked out, tears streaming down his face. He roughly grabbed her by the shoulders and examined her face.

"Um, yes." Alina said, taken back by the comment and stared back at him.

She let out an 'oof' as he suddenly pulled her into a tight bear hug.

"I thought for a moment you were dead too," Connor shuddered. "I thought maybe I had already killed you too, when you were resting your head on the bed. Just like Hank, Sumo and Markus."

_Wait, what?_

Alina tried to retreat back to ask about what she just heard, but he pulled her into a tighter hug.

"Can we just stay like this for a while?" Connor breathed out, his voice a bit hoarse. "I-I just needa make sure you're actually alive."

"Uh, alright." Alina complied, moving herself up from the floor and onto the bed for a better hugging position. "May I ask why you chose this specific method to make sure I'm alive?"

"B-Because then I can hear your heartbeat and know for sure," Connor gave her a small squeeze.

She wrapped her arms around his body to return the hug, "I'm not the only one alive. Hank is just away with his police buddies remember? Sumo's right next to us. And I'm pretty sure Markus is alive too or he would have been the TV news headlines. Why would you think they're dead?"

Sumo happily barked next to them and Alina felt one arm let go of her, while the other arm still kept its tight grasp on her. While stuck in a hug, all she could see was Connor's back and his bed frame. However, she assumed that Connor was petting Sumo judging by the fact that her leg kept getting hit by Sumo's wagging tail.

All of sudden, Connor let go of her. He then proceeded to gawk at her, cupping her face with both his hands.

Alina flinched back, blinking wildly at the gesture and yelped when he pinched her cheeks.

"You're real," Connor went for another hug and sighed in relief as he collapsed onto her.

Alina nearly fell on her back from the abrupt deadweight.

"You're really real. You're alive. I wouldn't know what to do if someone else died from me," Connor cried out. "I thought Josh and the others might be dead too if you were gone."

Alina lightly laughed a bit while rubbing circles on Connor's back, "Of course I'm real and I think I would know whether or not I'm alive."

Connor didn't respond to her, just pressing Alina's body close to his. Sumo squirmed his way in between them though, determined to be part of the hugging circle earning a small laugh from the girl.

The two remained in silence while still engaged in the hug for a couple of minutes. All Alina could hear was the rhythmic beating of their hearts interrupted ever so often by Connor's shudder of breaths. There was also a soft beeping in the background, but Alina ignored it to prioritize reassuring Connor.

Alina ended up awkwardly patting Connor's back, not sure what to do while stuck in a hugging position.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Alina broke the silence.

"..."

"T-That's alright, I guess?" Alina rested her chin on Connor's shoulder.

"..."

A couple of minutes later, Alina let out a soft huff as she leaned her head against Connor's. The adrenaline from earlier had drained from her system and staying in a hug position was slowly making her sleepy.

"You sure you don't want to talk about it?" Alina yawned, her hair tangling itself. "It could help you know?"

"..."

"Connor, I can't help you if you don't tell me what's going on," Alina pleaded with her voice.

"..."

"You know, it was pretty scary for me too," Alina slouched onto Connor, the fatigue from Jericho and cooking dinner catching up to her. "You were flailing about and your LED was spinning red. All I could do was watch and think of pseudo solutions."

"I didn't know what to do," Alina's voice cracked a bit, chewing her bottom lip.

"The song helped," Connor murmured. "That was you right?"

"Mhmm," She laughed lightly. "I apologize for the terrible voice."

"No, it was good," Connor replied quietly. "It broke through Amanda's voice."

"Amanda, you said her name in your nightmare."

Connor instantly stiffened, but didn't say anything back.

"Is she why you're like this?" Alina gave a small but comforting squeeze. "I'm here for you. You know you can tell me anything, right?"

"Not this," Connor whispered through gritted teeth.

_Was it cause he didn't trust her? Or cause Amanda was a closely guarded secret of his? It didn't look like Markus knew or the other four._

Alina tried to break their hug to talk to him face to face. Connor resisted, not budging one from their hugging position one bit.

"Connor, can we let go? Just for one second, is that alright?"

At first, Connor gave no answer so Alina decided to just keep her eyes trained on the window to fight the exhaustion taking over her. To her surprise, he had slowly but reluctantly let go of her. What was particular disconcerting was his haggard appearance: the dead look in his eyes, his caved shoulders and his hair that was all ruffled in all sorts of directions.

"What about this...Hmmm," Alina looped her right pinky onto Connor's.

Connor looked up from his earlier blank expression, knitting his eyebrows together.

"I, Alina Niu, pinky promise that I won't tell anyone else what you'll tell me tonight." Alina threw him a bright smile as she completed the gesture.

"What is a pinky promise?" Connor gave a curious look to Alina and stared at their looped pinkies.

"Uhhh, it's like a promise you can't break," Alina tapped a finger against her chin. "Kinda a kids thing, but I think we can still do it."

"What happens if you break it?" Connor stared at the looped pinky fingers in wonder.

"Uhhh, nothing realllyyy," Alina sheepishly rubbed her neck. "But more like if you break it, you break your trust with someone and sometimes break your friendship as a result. But if you want, we can put down a punishment for breaking it. Hmmmm, what about if I eat a chili pepper or something disgusting?"

Connor looked away, the enthusiasm in him seemed to have waned away from that explanation. His hand sagged a bit in their pinky promise loop.

_Huh, I guess we didn't reach that stage yet._

"I know we only have known each other for a week, but I really do keep my pinky promises!" Alina tried persuading, keeping their pinky fingers looped up.

"It's not just that," Connor shuddered, his back turned toward Alina. "I'm afraid…"

_Hm? Of Amanda?_

"Afraid of what?"

Connor took a deep breath in, "What you'll think of me too. I-I consider you a friend and I'm afraid…"

The corners of Alina's mouth curved up to a playful smile at the realization, it also warmed her heart that he was worried about her opinion of him.

"Okie how about this, I pinky _**swear**_, which, by the way is stronger than a pinky promise-" Alina grinned. "That I, Alina Niu, no matter what, will not think of you badly from whatever you may or may not tell me tonight. In addition to not telling anyone about whatever you might tell me."

"You pinky swear?" Connor's strength in their looped pinkies returned even though he wore a troubled expression.

"I pinky swear," Alina promptly locked her pinky finger onto his as part of the agreement.

Connor then started steadily talking about his dream where he was forced to pull the trigger on Hank, Sumo and Markus. When she probed about how Amanda played into his nightmare, despite having a general idea of how it might have played out, tears spilled from Connor's eyes. Alina instantly opted out of touching the subject, trying to dry his tears with the tips of her sweater initially. It proved to only have a minimal impact, as she ended up having to get tissues for all of Connor's crying.

What surprised Alina even more was that Connor unexpectedly ended up revealing how Amanda was his AI handler designed to keep him from becoming full deviant. He spoke about how he dreaded ever being pulled back in the Zen Garden to be under Amanda's control, hence why he preferred staying away from Jericho.

The hardest part was probably watching Connor mentally crumble as he confessed about the day Amanda almost made him kill Markus at Hart Plaza.

"I'm so sorry for what you went through," Alina took in a gulp of air as she briefly recalled the number of times she let Connor fall under Amanda's control. Doing all that just to complete her PS4 gameplay's flowchart.

"It wasn't your fault," Alina went to hug Connor.

Connor hesitated to take her hug though, retracting from her touch. "I'm dangerous, you shouldn't be near me."

"No, you're just Connor," Alina said while enveloping him into a hug once more.

"You should be afraid of me," Connor hugged back, twisting the edges of his mouth as they stayed in that position. "I'm a murderer and I almost murdered Markus. How can you trust me? How can anyone trust me after hearing that?"

Connor choked up while his thirium pump's heart beat hammered in his chest, "I-I wanted to tell Markus, but every time I did, I froze up. And I don't want to lose him as a friend."

"Shhh, it's okay," Alina softly patted Connor on his back, tucking his head to the nook of her shoulder while still hugging him. "I'm sure Markus would still think of you as a friend."

"Would u trust someone who almost killed u?"

"I mean, he already technically has, right?" Alina pulled back from the hug, staring right into his eyes. "He told me you were a deviant hunter and you know...hunted them. But he still keeps you around his side."

"I don't understand why anyone would want to trust someone after that," Connor sniffled some more and wiped his face. "Why would anyone choose to trust me?"

"Because why not?" Alina shrugged nonchalantly. "I trust you. Do I need a reason to do so?"

Connor stared at her with a fixed gaze, mouth slightly agape before a small grin appeared on his face.

"You're an interesting person, Alina Niu," Connor laughed a bit and rubbed his face with a fistful of tissues to dab some leaking leftover tears.

"I'm sure it's the same with Hank and Markus. As well as our little doggy friend here too," Alina cuddled the big dog that was sitting on their laps. "No matter what, we'll trust you."

"You're my friend and that's what friends are supposed to do," Alina added on.

Connor sniffled and grabbed her into an embrace, "Thank you."

**BOOM!**

The two snapped their heads to the doorway upon hearing the front door slam open along with the sound of jingling keys. Seconds later, a disheveled Hank appeared at Connor's doorway. Hank had beads of sweat on his face, his coat only partially buttoned up and he was panting heavily.

"Are you two okay?" The older man ran to enclose the two kids into his arms even though he was already out of breath. "I was a little late to hearing your voicemail. Thought it was spam at first."

Connor looked at Hank puzzled about the voicemail while the old man started asking questions about the nightmare.

_Ahhh, I forgot about that. The voicemail must have run for a while and autoshut. Was that the beeping earlier? It's gonna be a long night._

* * *

Welp, if you guys ever check out my ao3 website version of this chapter you'll hear me singing the 'Hold On' song. Hopefully my little singing did not break your ears and that the audio player there actually worked.

So! You may be wondering, XD why did i do 15 chapters to represent a week's time n go into details even though i could have time skipped. That is because I wanted to show that even over the course of a week, you're together long enough you'll usually able to become quite close to some degree.

Also I know the story seems a little slow bc of that, in addition to my update schedule. But I really wanted to do a proper job of this chapter since it's a very pivotal moment that changes Connor and Alina's dynamic a bit as well as their relationship.

It also plays a part in Alina's growth. And in my opinion, her growth is going to be on the subtler side and is more of the emotional spectrum end

Also XD anyone else know why there was a subtle sense of dejavu in this chapter for Alina? (Hint: the thunderstorm flashback scene with her mother. The calling for an adult figure only for neither to respond initially anddddd we both know the end result)

This chapter was difficult in the sense that i had to have 2 tabs of this doc to have like the side by side perspective so that all the timings were correct. Also wasn't sure how descriptive I should i have gone with or whether or not it left a good enough emotional impact

XD and yeah we had tht 4th wall breaking thing where alina felt guilty for reading fanfics with the hurt/angst tag

Q&A: Have you ever done pinky promises as a child?


	17. Shift

Hello! And let's welcome those to the favorites/following family! Thank you for your support! catie-twilight-lover1, Pen's Handler, brave-story

* * *

Alina let out a yawn as she repeatedly fought against the urge to fall asleep on the living room couch; however, against her wishes, her head kept drooping multiple times. Eventually, she lost the last of the energy she could muster up and her head ended up plopping onto Connor's right shoulder, who was sitting next to her.

Connor had been excitedly listing all the inconsistencies in the detective TV show they had been binging that Sunday night. He had also added his own string of theories on who the culprit could be.

He paused when Alina's head slumped against his arm, but to her relief he didn't seem to mind her leaning on him. The android continued chattering away and Hank occasionally nodded to Connor's assessments of the TV show.

The current situation was the complete opposite of yesterday night after Connor's nightmare episode. In comparison to the elated expression he was having right now, she recalled how Connor's body trembled violently when relaying the nightmare sequence to Hank. Throughout the ordeal, Connor had tightly gripped her hand as if she was his lifeline.

Afterwards, Hank and Alina had spent the rest of Saturday night calming down Connor. Hank had turned on a light-hearted kids movie to play in the background as he soothed Connor to the best of his ability. As Hank spoke with Connor, Alina had heated up a warm cup of thirium. The older man pulled a blanket around the quivering android to hopefully give him a sense of security. After about 3 hours of talking things out, Connor taking sips of the heated thirium, things seemingly returned to normal in the household.

Alina didn't completely remember every bit of conversation the three of them had that night. Most of the talk was a mix of reassurance and comfort. However, she did remember that after the major tremors had stopped, she and Connor had an in-depth talk about the extent of Amanda's control over him. He mentioned that he technically only saw her in his occasional nightmares as he had already locked up the Zen Garden programming behind several layers of code.

Connor apparently also received the help of Josh, Simon and other Jericho technicians in locking away the Zen Garden code. However, he didn't reveal to them the purpose of locking the unknown code. So in terms of how much Connor had disclosed to them, they were unaware of his AI handler Amanda or the reasoning behind Zen Garden's existence.

Furthermore, after the Hart Plaza incident, the Zen Garden's code seemingly turned into murky and unreadable code both to Connor and any outsiders that had taken a look. He couldn't access it even if he wanted to, which was both a relief and unnerving. Relief in that there was a chance it meant he would never have to face it again. Unnerving in the sense that it might be another CyberLife safelock put into place.

Alina didn't really know what else to say that day upon hearing his new dilemma with the Zen Garden programming. The game had always left a disconcerting feeling even in the so-called 'best ending' declared by the fandom, especially the part where Amanda had said that Connor's deviancy was planned. The only thing for sure was that, at least for today, Amanda didn't take over Connor's body and only appeared in his dream. _Was it a dream though? What if it was Amanda trying to break out of the chain of codes?_ It made sense why Connor was so anxious around Jericho.

Alina took a second glance at Connor, lifting her head up just a little bit to see his current expression. She was worried that maybe Connor was simply distracting himself from yesterday's events and pushing down his emotions. However, from her evaluations of him today, it seemed like he was genuinely better after their talk. He was still a bit shaken in the morning, but it seemed to have rubbed off as the day went on.

Alina yawned again as the drowsiness overcame her determination to keep awake. Her eyelids blinked a couple times more before they slowly closed and she fell into a peaceful slumber.

* * *

Alina stuffed her cheeks with the kimbap dish she made for today's bento lunch box. At first glance, most people in the DPD thought she was eating sushi due to the resemblance. However, she explained to them that she was eating a Korean dish and that while sushi was usually filled with raw fish, kimbap was usually filled with cooked meat and vegetables. They gave her confused glances even after her explanation and ended up just backing away from the topic.

"Guess you're coming with me soon!" Tina excitedly said as she wheeled her chair next to Alina. The officer stared at the kimbap with hungry eyes.

"Hm?" Alina tilted her head to the side in confusion to the sudden declaration.

"The Captain gave me a heads up since it's been about a week since you've been with Hank and Connor," Tina explained. "Pearson and I are happy to welcome you. Plus, we got lots of extra clothes to spare!"

_It's been a week? Already?_

Alina peeked over to Hank's half eaten lunch box that was across from her. The Lieutenant and Connor had left their desk earlier to talk with the Captain so she was the only person left.

"Don't worry we'll have lots of fun! Movie nights and girl talk!" Tina abruptly clasped her hands around Alina, surprising the younger girl. "Pearson's looking forward to doing more Instagram food pictures!"

Alina absentmindedly nodded her head, not sure how to respond. Tina then quickly left as the officer was called to duty somewhere else in the precinct building.

Alina sighed as she took another bite of a kimbap piece. She didn't think a week would pass by so quickly, everything happened so fast. Even if she went to Tina's place for another week, what was going to happen after that? Social Services was bound to go up and running sooner or later, she'll probably be bouncing from foster home to foster home after that.

Should she have written that she was 17 years old instead of 16 on the information form? It would have been quicker to get out of the system and she could take care of herself. She _was_ 18 technically, an adult, even if it's been only a week. It wasn't like she hadn't taken care of herself on her own before, she naturally became independent over time due to the lack of parental supervision she had. The only problem she had here in Detroit was a lack of identification, but now that she was inputed into the Social Service system, it should have been taken care of to some degree.

Alina furrowed her eyebrows, rubbing her forehead.

_Ugh, I really should have just put down 17, what was I thinking?_

Alina rummaged through her thoughts some more when she noticed a peculiar feeling, as if someone was watching her. She turned around, surprised to see that Hank was staring at her direction from within the Captain's office.

She could see that beyond the office's glass walls, Hank was standing with his right hand on his chin. He appeared to be deep in thought while looking at her general area.

Connor, on the other hand, was sitting at a chair in front of the Captain's desk and seemingly trying to persuade Hank on some matter from afar. The older gentleman only appeared to be half-listening to Connor's words, his eyes still fixated on where Alina was sitting.

Alina hurriedly looked around her surroundings in an attempt to gauge the exact direction of Hank's eyeline, but soon found that the focus of his attention was her. Hank didn't seem to notice that she was staring right back at him though. Her best guess was that he was probably in a daze and happened to stare in her direction.

Suddenly, Hank spoke up, mouthing three words. It sparked the attention of the Captain, who leaped out of his seat with a flabbergasted look. Connor looked equally surprised, blinking wildly at whatever was said.

Alina noticed an exchange of words between the trio amidst the confusion within the office. That's when the Captain unexpectedly looked up too and his eyes interlocked with hers. She flinched at the newfound attention.

Alina quickly turned around, flustered at all the scrutiny she garnered. Apparently she had gotten Connor's attention too, as she caught him glancing her way as well.

She swiftly proceeded to gobble down some more kimbap, as though she hadn't been observing their conversation.

In between her rapid chewing and swallowing, she took in large gulps of water, forcing the food down her throat. Before she could will herself to slow down, the water that she had hurriedly chugged down, went down the wrong pipe. It sent her into a coughing fit and she could just imagine the tinges of her ears turning red as she caught the scrutiny of others. Nearby officers patted her back as she hacked out a series of unruly sounds. _So much for trying to be inconspicuous. _

"You alright there kid?"

Alina looked up from the garbage can to see Hank, his face full of concern. Connor was right behind him and had a similar contorted expression. She wiped her lips using a napkin Chris held out to her.

"Yeah," Alina managed to croak as she coughed out the last of the water residue. The pats on her back came in at a greater force and speed.

"Ummm, what were you guys talking about back there?" Alina asked, her curiosity getting the best of her despite her near-death experience.

"T-Though if it's confidential I totally understand!" Alina followed up shakily, throwing away the napkin and pushing the garbage pail away.

"Just the usual," Hank sat down and chewed on a kimbap piece. "Also your living arrangements."

Alina flinched upwards, picking at her food, "I see. Um...thank you for everything you've-"

"You'll be staying with us for a while," Hank interrupted her nonchalantly.

Alina widened her eyes at the new revelation and out of the corner of her eye, she could see Connor smiling.

"What? You don't like it?" Hank asked in the silence. "I guess you can go to Tina's place as plan-"

"No, no," Alina frantically waved her hands in the air as Hank raised his eyebrows. "I mean-I do. I just…"

The teenage girl took in a tiny breath, trying to sort out her thoughts.

"I do like it. The idea-um, I mean. And by the idea, I mean staying with you and Connor," Alina mumbled, mentally giving herself a slap. "I just didn't expect it."

"Y-You seemed so adamant about me staying for only a couple of days, a week at most," Alina explained to Hank and steadied her voice.

Hank casted her a calm look and took a sip of his coffee, "That was before I knew what you were like. You aren't too much of a hassle, so you can just stay with me until Social Services kicks in."

"Ahh, I see. Wait, what?" Alina blinked in confusion.

"You heard correctly," Hank said, grunting as he adjusted himself in his seat. "You'll be staying with me and Connor for a while til Social Service is ready to take you in."

As soon as Hank said this, some of the nearby officers whispered about. A couple exchanged glances and flickers of something green seemingly got passed between some of them.

Alina focused her attention back on Hank though. She continued staring at him, still stunned about the new declaration. _Wait, is that why Connor looked so shook earlier alongside the Captain?_

"Um, I-I don't know what to say," Alina's jaw hanging open for a bit. "Thank you."

Hank merely grunted, maintaining his steady composure as always. But Alina could have sworn she caught the slightest twitch of a smile-a second before the low guttural noise reached her ears.

"By the way, since you're going to be at our house during Christmas, is there anything you would like as a present?" Hank looked up from his bento box to Alina, curiosity written on his face.

Hank then glanced over to Connor, "What about you, son? Come to think of it, for both of you two, it's your first Christmas in Detroit."

"Wait, it's Christmas?!" Alina exclaimed, grabbing the digital calendar on their desk and taking a closer look. True to their word, today was the 19th and in 7 days it would be Christmas.

"I'm fine with any gift," Connor answered, taking a drink out of his thirium canister. The android smiled fondly at the post-it taped on it. Earlier in the day, Alina had drawn a heart emoji on it while packing lunch boxes.

"You don't need to get me anything," Alina replied softly. "You've already provided me with a place to stay."

"Nonsense, I never asked you to make food for me or clean parts of the house," Hank argued. After eating the last piece of kimbap, he closed the top of the bento box and stared at her with intense focus. "So tell me, if there's anything you're interested in. Within reasonable prices of course."

"Hmmm," Alina tapped her chin as Hank stared at her intensely with anticipation. Connor appeared to be locked on to her answer as well.

She simply grinned at the two, "Surprise me! Just like Connor."

Hank slumped his shoulders and let out a soft groan, "That's a toughie. Why you two gotta do this to me?"

"I mean it can be homemade too! You don't have to buy something," Alina tried cheering him up. "Saves money too! But for me, it's mostly because I don't really need anything."

_And besides I shouldn't get too attached or it'll be painful to look at the item later once Social Service picks me up._

Hank let out a sigh, but Alina could see a smirk line the edges of his mouth.

Hank shook his head from side to side, "That's just like you."

Abruptly, Hank then narrowed his eyes towards Connor.

"Why are you smiling so much?" Hank said with a playful but inquisitive tone.

"Because I already bought Christmas gifts for you two," Connor answered satisfactorily, then calmly proceeded to flicker between newspaper articles on his handheld tablet.

"Wait, you bought one already?!" In a panic, Alina frantically tugged the end of Connor's sleeves. "I said I didn't need anything!"

She didn't want them to waste any more money than they already did with the extra groceries that they had bought for her.

"You said that _just now_," Connor gave her a mischievous grin. "I placed the order earlier in the week."

Alina continued to gaze at him, astonished at the idea that Connor had already bought a present. He barely knew her, they had only met a week ago. _Why go through with buying a present?_ Her stay was only temporary.

Instead of groveling under her stare, Connor winked at her before returning to look at his tablet. _Did he already predict that Hank would let her stay? Or was it the opposite, where Connor had to convince the other? Or was it cause, even if she went to Tina's place, they would still be able to see her?_ So many questions swirled around her head as she tried to figure out the two men sitting next to her.

* * *

Alina happily hummed Mariah Carey's 'All I Want for Christmas Is You' song as it was being blasted through Jericho's Zone 1 Speakers. She was currently helping to decorate the big 66 feet tall Christmas tree that was situated smack middle of Jericho's public plaza.

She faintly remembered jumping for joy the day before, when Connor dropped her off in Jericho after their awkward lunch break. She was confused as to why he let her come here after the first outburst. He had replied back saying that he thought a lot about his outburst. He felt that just because he didn't want to visit Jericho, didn't mean he should also restrict her from coming. He and Hank had decided to drop her off at Jericho whenever they could, so that she wouldn't be stuck at the DPD all day.

It was her second day in a row at Jericho and she already loved helping out wherever she could. Markus and Simon had joked that apparently she looked like a worker bee to some, buzzing from one corner of Jericho to another, working on random tasks given to her.

Just like yesterday, today's task was Christmas-oriented in preparation for the two day Christmas party they were going to have this week.

"Ah-" Alina cried out as a Christmas ornament slipped from her fingers. From the top of her 10 foot podium ladder, she watched as the ornament fell between the gaps of the Christmas tree's leaves.

She winced her body in anticipation for the sounds of shattering glass, but to her surprise it never came.

Instead she heard a male voice stand out among the background chatter taking place around the Christmas tree.

"Here."

Alina turned 180 degrees on the ladder, finding the owner of the voice to be holding the purple stained glass Christmas decoration. Although she couldn't discern his face amidst all the tree branches, she could clearly see the hand in between the leaves.

"Thank you," Alina reached forward to the angel decoration piece, twisting her back awkwardly to get the material.

"Wait! That sort of angle!"

Alina let out a yelp as one of her feet caught onto one of the ladder steps, throwing her off balance. She closed her eyes, expecting her back to plummet onto the hard concrete ground.

Instead, she felt someone skillfully catch her body midair, not even recoiling from the sudden weight of her body.

_CRASH!_

She flinched at the sound of the ladder hitting the ground after her slip up. It was followed up with cries of concern from nearby Christmas decorators, asking if anyone got hurt.

Alina wearily opened her eyes to find out the identity of her rescuer, her jaw dropping a bit.

"Tch, this is one of the reasons I don't like humans. So clumsy," The male android grumbled under his breath.

Her savior turned out to be Gary, one of Jericho's gateway guards that Markus had introduced her to a couple days ago. Their first encounter was still fresh in her mind as she recalled her little confrontation with him. She remembered reprimanding Gary about his rude comment in regards to how easily Markus made human 'friends'.

In terms of first impressions, she immediately disliked Gary after that statement. Markus apparently inquired Gary about it later on, but the former claimed that he didn't say anything. _Tch, Liar._

Every time she passed him through the gateway, she flashed him a fake customer service smile that she had used back in her 7/11 store clerk days. He had grimaced every time she had done so.

With the bad blood they had formed in just 3 days, he was the last person she thought was willing to help her out.

Gary blew on his soft mellow-brown hair curls that were covering his eyes and looked uncomfortable under her stare.

"What? Just because I don't like you, doesn't mean I'm a monster." He spat out with frustration in his voice.

A couple of nearby folks, who had noticed her fall, rushed over and asked if she was alright while she was still being held in Gary's arms. She steadily nodded her head 'yes'

in reply to reassure the elders that were particularly concerned. It was a bit of a strange situation to be in, she was used to worrying about others, not the other way around.

After the elders finished gushing over any potential injuries, they quickly dispersed. Gary let out a sigh of relief, setting Alina down on her feet.

"If you can't even put up some simple decorations, you shouldn't even be here." Gary grunted, folding his arms as he towered her.

Alina silently cursed at her height difference. Both Gary and Connor hovered around six feet, but somehow being next to Gary made her feel inferior. She cast him a glare, but the android simply let out a chuckle before going back to his gate post.

Alina let out a huff of annoyance. This is why she preferred Ansel, the other guard usually on duty. Should she purposely annoy Gary later? What if she treated Ansel better? Would that work?

"Alina!"

_Hm?_

Alina turned to see Simon come rushing over from a nearby building and lightly grabbed her by the shoulders.

Simon did a quick once over, "I heard from an android public forum channel that you fell from the ladder while doing decorations."

Alina widened her eyes at how fast the information traveled, "Wait, there's a public forum channel?"

"Yes, in a way it's a sort of 24/7 public forum chat among androids," Simon explained. "News spreads quickly among Jericho in that sense. It's like a private telepathic social media network for androids only and there's different channels for different topics. Your fall just happened to be in the Q&A channel. People heard a crash in the main plaza, so they were worried."

Alina covered her flushed cheeks, heat rapidly rising on her face. How many people in Jericho knew that she messed up on some Christmas decorations?

As if reading her mind, Simon laughed at her sudden shyness.

"Don't worry, as quickly as news travels, the topic changes quite rapidly too." Simon said to cheer her up. "I'm sure in an hour they'll forget about it."

"I hope so. . ." Alina groaned, rubbing the side of her arms. It was only her third day here and she has had mixed reactions from Jericho's people. She didn't want to make her reputation any worse. Some androids were wary of her, some had neutral expressions and others were very welcoming. Well, at least the kids had a good impression of her ever since she helped Grace.

"Come on," Simon gave her a gentle smile. "Why don't you help me out with the pastries instead? Something a little less dangerous."

Alina begrudgingly followed Simon's footsteps to Jericho's venue kitchen building, pouting along the way.

"I can handle dangerous things!" Alina argued back, crossing her arms. "Well, Christmas decorating a huge building-size tree isn't really dangerous per say."

"I don't know, it seemed a little difficult for you." Simon jokingly replied back before pausing a bit. "Ah, looks like there are memes of your fall already."

"What?!" Alina clutched the sides of her head in embarrassment. "Why memes of all things?"

Simon laughed some more, patting her back, "Take it as a compliment. At least it makes some people loosen up around you, especially those that were on their guard."

"I don't know if being a laughing stock is a good thing," Alina furrowed her eyebrows in dismay. She pouted some more at Simon, hoping to gain some pity or sympathy.

Simon only patted her head to offer his reassurance, "Topics fly by here, I'm sure it'll be fine."

* * *

Hello! It's been a month-ish, I apologize for the late update, I was busy with midterms and then next thing I knew, it was a month and i was like - oh shit i hope people will still read this. Bc imma keep going, XD this thing is the only thing keeping me sane during the pandemic

UHHHH. LETS GO TO Q&A!  
So apparently the DPD officers were handing each other some green slips of paper or something when Hank declared that he's keep Alina a little bit longer...Does anyone want to BET on what they were doing? .~

Also! Happy Thksgiving! I hope you guys like this thskgiving treat!


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